SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 



By ARNOLD BENNETT 



NOVELS 

THE ROLL-CALL 

THE PRETTY LADY 

THE lion's share 

THESE TWAIN 

CLAYHANGER 

HILDA LESSWAYS 

THE OLD WIVES' TALE 

DENRY THE AUDACIOUS 

THE OLD ADAM , 

HELEN WITH THE HIGH HAND 

THE MATADOR OF THE FIVE TOWNS 

THE BOOK OF CARLOTTA 

BURIED ALIVE 

A GREAT MAN 

LEONORA 

WHOM GOD HATH JOINED 

A MAN FROM THE NORTH 

ANNA OF THE FIVE TOWNS 

THE GLIMPSE 

THE CITY OF PLEASURE 

THE GRAND BABYLON HOTEL 

HUGO 

THE GATES OF WRATH 

POCKET PHILOSOPHIES 

SELF AND SELF-MANAGEMENT 
THE AUTHOR'S CRAFT 
MARRIED LIFE 
FRIENDSHIP AND HAPPINESS 
HOW TO LIVE ON 24 HOURS A DAY 
THE HUMAN MACHINE 
LITERARY TASTE 
MENTAL EFFICIENCY 

PLAYS 

SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 
JUDITH 
THE TITLE 

THE GREAT ADVENTURE 
CUPID AND COMMONSENSE 
WHAT THE PUBLIC WANTS 
POLITE FARCES 
THE HONEYMOON 
IN COLLABORATION WITH EDWARD KNOBLAUCH 
MILESTONES 

MISCELLANEOUS 

PARIS NIGHTS 

THE TRUTH ABOUT AN AUTHOR 

LIBERTY! 

OVER there: war SCENES 

GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 
NEW YORK 



SACRED AND 
PROFANE LOVE 

A PLAY IN THREE ACTS 



FOUNDED ON THE NOVEL OP 
THE SAME NAME 



BY 
ARNOLD BENNETT 

Author of "Judith," "Clayhanger," 

"The RoU CaU," "The Old Wives' 

Tale," "The Title," etc. 



GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS NEW YORK 



W\ 



oo^ 






Copyright, 1920, 
By George H. Doran Company 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 



©CI.D 5:^)3 2 



CHARACTERS 

Chaelotta Peel 

Emilio Diaz 

Feank Ispenlove 

Mary Ispenlove, his wife 

Emmeline Palmer, Charlotta's secretary 

Snape, Diaz's secretary 

Mrs. Joicey 

Louisa Benbow, her sister 

Lord Francis Alcar 

Mrs. Sardis 

JocELYN Sardis, her daughter 

Rosalie 

Leonie 

A Parlourmaid 



SACRED AND PROFANE 
LOVE 

ACT I 

SCENE I 

Mrst Joicey^s sitting-room on the first floor 
of her house in the Five Towns, Door 
L, {^as one faces the footlights'], and double 
doors hack centre. The latter open into a 
bedroom. There is a great deal of furni- 
ture, all dating from the seventies: many 
and various chairs, sundry tables, a sofa, a 
canterbury, rugs, antimacassars, mats, wax 
flowers under glass domes, a gas chandelier, 
and a grand piano in walnut [with the key- 
board towards the back wall]. Over the 
mantelpiece an extensive enlarged photo- 
graph of a middle-aged man, in a rosewood 
frame. The wvndow is not shown. Although 
most of the furniture is ugly, the general 
aspect of the crowded room is picturesque 
rather than ugly. It is bright-coloured, and 
has the distinction of a bygone style. 

Time. — Eleven o'clock at night. The chandelier 
is lighted, 

7 



8 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Mrs. Joicey and Louisa are talking together. A 
faint knocking is heard from the front door 
on the ground floor, 

Mrs. Joicey. Bless usf Here they come! 
Now don't spill the lemonade. And do run down 
and open the door. 

Louisa. Oh! [Begins to remove her apron."] 

Mrs. Joicey. What are you taking that apron 
off for, Louisa? 

Louisa. All the work's done. Why should I 
pretend to be a servant when I'm your sister? 

Mrs. Joicey. Louisa, have I got to begin that 
all over again? A nice thing! As like as not 
Mr. Diaz would tell all his London friends that 
I can't afford a servant ! I should never get 
another travelling concert party. It's cruel how 
things like that'll spread. It's just as much for 
your sake as mine. Don't I keep you? If I 
didn't I should be a lot better off than I am. 
Isn't as if I asked you to wear a cap as well. 
I don't. 

Louisa. D'you know what he did as they went 
off to the concert? 

Mrs. Joicey [anxious about the door]. Who 
did? Mr. Diaz? 

Louisa. No, the secretary. 

Mrs. Joicey. What did he do? 

Louisa. In the passage he said — when he was 
telling me about the fowl for supper — "There's 



ACT I 9 

a good girl," he said, and he patted me on the 
cheek. I never told you, but he patted my cheek, 
and so now you know. 

Mrs. Joicey. Mr. Snape did? 

Louisa. Yes, Mr. Snape did. 

Mrs. Joicey. And what did you do? 

Louisa. WeU, I acted the parlourmaid. I 
always did want to go on the stage. 

Mrs. Joicey. But what did you do? 

Louisa. Don't I tell you I acted the regular 
parlourmaid? And thankful you ought to be. 
I just smiled. 

Mrs, Joicey. Well I never! 

Louisa [in another tone'\. Somehow I couldn't 
help it. [In her former tone.'] But when he'd 
gone I didn't like the look of it so much. I said 
to myself. If he does it again, he's going to do 
it to Miss Benbow, not to any parlourmaid, and 
then we shall know where we are, I said. 

Mrs. Joicey. Louisa — [another knock]. Now 
put that apron on this minute and go and an- 
swer the door. [With curt persuasiveness.] 
Come! 

Louisa [hesitating]. If I do, it's got to be 
understood that /'m going to answer the bell, 
if they ring up here, by myself, without you 
poking your nose in and asking, "Is the 'maid' 
looking after you properly, gentlemen?" like you 
did at teatime. And /'m going to turn the beds 
down, too. 



10 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Mrs. Joicey. Oh, well — if it's like that — -. — 

Louisa, Well it is, sister. 

Mrs, Joicey. Very good! 

[Exit Louisa, l, putting on the apron.'\ 

[Mrs, Joicey examines the table, and then the 

room. Perceiving that the portrait over the 

mantelpiece is crooked, she sets a chair, steps 

on it, and straightens the portrait.'] 

Enter Mr. Snape. 

Mrs. Joicey, Good evening, Mr. Snape. I 
hope the weather didn't interfere with the concert. 

Snape, We played to capacity, Mrs. Joicey. 

Mrs. Joicey. '^Capacity?" What's that? 

Snape, Never heard of it in this district be- 
fore, I suppose. Capacity, madam, is — er — 
sardines. 

Mrs. Joicey. Oh! I see! 

Snape. I doubt if we ever played better, ex- 
cept perhaps once in St. Petersburg. Four en- 
cores given. Three refused. Personally I should 
have given three and refused four. But then 
Five Towns audiences are very warm, very warm. 

Mrs. Joicey, Oh, we are! But we're very 
critical too. So they say. 

Snape. Do they? Supper all ready? Where's 
the cold fowl? [^Loohs at table.] 

Mrs. Joicey, The maid will bring it. Did Mr. 
Diaz come in with you? 

Snape [with low, precise, slow enunciation^. 
Dee-az. 



ACT I 11 

Mrs, Joicey. We call it Dyaz down here. 

Snape. You would. You shouldn't. Now I 
want some cakes. 

Mrs. Joicey, I can't get cakes now. All the 
shops are shut. 

Snape. I must have cakes — [lusciously'] sweet 
spongy ones, with jam in them. 

Mrs. Joicey. But you distinctly told me that 
you and Mr. Diaz never took anything but cold 
fowl and some milk and a siphon of soda-water. 
[Enter Louisa.] Here is the fowl. 

Snape [to Louisa]. What's your name.? I 
don't think I caught it. 

Louisa [acting the parlourmaid], Louisa — 
sir. 

Snape, Well, Louisa, I want some cakes for 
supper. Your mistress says she can't get any at 
this time of night. Can't you? 

Louisa [reflecting, as she deposits the fowl]. 
There's the cold jam roly-poly. I might cut it 
into thin slices and sift some sugar on them. 

Snape, Louisa, please go and sift some sugar 
on them. [Exit Louisa.] 

Mrs. Joicey, I'd thought of the jam roly-poly 
myself, but I doubt you'll hardly care for it. 

Snape. Never mind. 

Mrs. Joicey, But I do mind. 

Snape. I shouldn't. I shan't be here for sup- 
per myself. 



12 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Mrs, Joicey. Then you'll only want supper 
for one. 

Snape. Mr. Diaz has a friend coming. 

Mrs, Joicey [assuming that what she says is 
so']. Another gentleman. 

Snape. Well — perhaps not exactly. A lady. 
They will be here in a moment. 

Mrs. Joicey. Oh dear! Mr. Snape! I know 
the musical profession isn't what it was in my 
young married days. I never expected in those 
days to let rooms; but I've kept this house re- 
spectable and I mean to. You see that portrait 
there. That's the portrait of my husband. He 
invented the hire-purchase system for pianos and 
American organs. At least in this district. He 
was the best man that ever lived. I'm very sorry, 
but I can't have any carryings-on in this room 
for that portrait to see. 

Snape [after a pause]. Take the portrait 
down. 

Mrs. Joicey. I shall take down no portrait — 
and I don't care who Mr. Diaz is, if you under- 
stand what I mean. 

Snape. Quite — quite. But the lady is a pupil. 

Mrs. Joicey [brightening]. Oh! If it's a 
pupil — ! I was quite used to pupils in my mar- 
ried days. My husband was always considered 
the best teacher of the pianoforte, American or- 
gan, and clarionet in this district. The Stafford- 
shire Advertiser called him facile princeps. He 



ACT I 13 

once played a duet with Rubinstein on that very 
piano. That was the day Rubinstein gave a con- 
cert at Hanbridge. Very hearty, Rubinstein was. 
Came upstairs and all. When they'd done play- 
ing he kissed my husband. Mr. Joicey didn't 
quite like that, but being in the profession, you 
see, he couldn't very well say anything. Rubin- 
stein didn't stay here, but of course I wasn't 
letting rooms in those days. Never dreamt of 
such a thing. Only now it's thanks to my musical 
connections, and that grand piano, that musicians 

on tour generally prefer this house 

Enter Louisa rather quickly, 

Louisa, I heard the front gate creak as I came 
upstairs. 

Snape [who has been calmly gazing at Mrs, 
Joicey, now gazing at the sliced dumpling']. So 
that is the sliced roly-poly! [Takes the plate 
from Louis a, '\ 

Mrs, Joicey [to Louisa], Better get on with 
your duties, Louisa. 

Louisa, Will it do, sir.? 

Snape. It will. 
[Exit Louisa by double doors at bacJc, which 
reveal bedroom.] 

Mrs. Joicey [half reflectively]. And what does 
he teach at this time o' night, I wonder? 

Snape [putting down plate]. Mrs. Joicey, 
what a question! Mr. Diaz is usually considered 
to be the greatest pianist after Rubinstein. Cer- 



U SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

tainly the greatest interpreter of Chopin since 
Chopin died. 

Mrs. Joicey [smoothly']. Oh, I know! I know 
some of them have pupils that follow 'em about 
from place to place. [^KnocTn heard below.] I'd 
better answer the door. 

Louisa [who has reappeared at double-doors]. 
I'll run down. 

Snape [with a preventing gesture]. 1 will go. 
[Indicating the double doors, to both women, con- 
spiratorially.] This way please — and out by the 
passage — at once. [Exit l.] 

Louisa. What's afoot? 

Mrs. Joicey. Nothing, miss. 

Louisa, Then my name's not Louisa. 

Mrs, Joicey. There's a lady coming, seem- 
ingly. It's a pupil. 

Louisa [glancing at the dumpling plate]. 
Sweet-tooth ! 

Snape [heard off]. Everything is in order, sir. 

Louisa [in a whisper]. He told us to go at 
once. 

Mrs. Joicey [somewhat rebellious]. And what 
if he did! 

[Exeunt Mrs. Joicey and Louisa bacJc. The 
double doors are closed reluctantly. Snape 
ushers Diaz and Carlotta into the room, L, 
and exit.] 

Diaz. Now which chair will you have ? [ Waving 
a hand comically to indicate the various chairs.] 



ACT I 15 

You see them! They are all equally — hostile to 
the human form. 

Carlotta [^still near the door, smiling timidly'\. 
Is he gone — Mr. — you introduced us, but I forget 
his name — your secretary? 

Diaz. Snape? He probable considers that his 
day's work is over. He's just — gone, that's all. 
I never inquire, you know. 

Carlotta. I think I'd better go too. 

Diaz. But — I thought you — we — I thought it 
was understood that you waited here till it was 
time to go across to the station for the mail- 
train. 

Carlotta. Everything's different now I'm ac- 
tually here. It was all right when we were driving 
down from Hanbridge with Mr. Snape in the car. 
I suppose it was the rain made it seem so matter- 
of-fact. I was frightened when we found the 
train had gone, but when I thought of the mail- 
train and you went with me to the stationmaster 
to see if I could travel by it, I felt all right 
again. It seemed the most natural thing in the 
world that I should come and wait here for an 
hour with you and Mr. Snape, instead of waiting 
all alone at the station. You were so natural. 

Diaz. And am I not natural now? 

Carlotta. Oh, yes ! But — of course I quite 
understand about Mr. Snape — but — somehow — 
Besides, you must be too frightfully tired to play 
any more to-night. 



■J 



16 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

(Diaz [gently^. Now, is that quite — quite sin- 
cere — that last? 

Carlotta. No, it isn't. I don't really believe 
you're ever tired. But — it's like this. You may 
feel natural. But I don't feel natural — not any 
more. I think I'd better go, truly. I don't want 
you to come with me. I can run back to the sta- 
tion in a jiffy — it has nearly stopped raining. 

Diaz, I'm very sorry, very sorry. Before 
you go, won't you tell me your name.? 

Carlotta [after a pause, low^, Magdalen. 

Diaz [incredulous, quicMy^. It isn't. 

Carlotta [on her dignity^. Excuse me 

Diaz. I beg your pardon. Do forgive me, 
please. There's only one thing I'd like to say. 
I hope you don't think for one moment that I've 
been trying to — inveigle you here. 

Carlotta [smiles calmly']. Mr. Diaz, I knew 
exactly what I was doing — and when I did it. 

Diaz. "When you did it.?" 

Carlotta. You see, I sat such a long time in 
the hall, while the people were going out. I 
don't know how it was — the music I suppose — 
your music — I couldn't move. 
/^., Diaz. I was watching you. 

j ' Carlotta. Watching me.? 

/ Diaz. Yes, from behind. I was just on the 

point of coming round, or sending Mr. Snape, 
when you got up and left. You were the last 
to go. I followed you. 



ACT I 17 

Carlotta. But why? 

Diaz. I thought I might just possibly have 
a chance of thanking you — for the way you'd 
listened to me. 

Carlotta \_dreamily~\. How strange! \_Sud- 
denly.^ Why did you have the piano moved 
half-way across the platform at the interval? 

Diaz. So that I could see you better while I 
was playing. 

Carlotta. It's unbelievable. 

Diaz. On the contrary! If you knew what a 
really sympathetic listener means to an artist! 
Just one — in a whole audience ! The artist plays 
to that one. ... So when I caught sight of you 
almost alone in the portico, I collected all my 
courage and came straight up to you and did 
thank you. That was how it all came about. 

Carlotta. No, Mr. Diaz, it didn't begin to 
come about until I said to you, "If you want to 
thank me you can thank me by getting me a cab." 
As soon as I'd said that I knew exactly what 
I*^ done. I can't imagine what ever made me 
say such a thing. I know I do talk like that 
sometimes, but to you! 

Diaz. Not a bit. It was the most natural an- 
swer in the world. In fact I deserved it. And 
as I had a car waiting for me and we were going 
in the same direction — I shan't say I'm sorry 
we missed the train, because I'm not. 

Carlotta, Well, thank you very much for being 



18 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

so kind [^holding out her hand, which he takes'\. 

[Diaz. I should like to have played to you — 
here, just you and I together. 

Carlotta [withdrawing from him and throwing 
back her wrap']. I'm insulting you! 

Diaz [puzzled]. And how? 

Carlotta. By saying that I won't stay till 
it's time to go to the station. Yes, I'm insulting 
you! Nobody could play like you play if he 
wasn't as straight as a die. 

[In silence he takes her wrap, and she sits down 
with an abrupt girlish gesture.] 

Diaz [quietly]. That's not quite true to life, 
you know. 

Carlotta. What isn't? 

Diaz. That serious artists are — well — always 
straight. 

Carlotta. Isn't it? 

Diaz. No. You're very young and inex- 
perienced. 

Carlotta. Indeed I'm not inexperienced. I've 
had my eyes wide open for ages. 

Diaz [sitting down; in an easy, brotherly tone]. 
Well, tell me something about those ages. 

Carlotta. No, no ! You must talk. 

Diaz. I thought I was to play. 

Carlotta. Now [Stops.] 

Diaz. Yes ? 

Carlotta [leaning forward]. Do you under^ 
stand people? 



ACT I 19 

Diaz. I think so. 

Carlotta. You know what I mean — under- 
stand? 

Diaz. Yes. 

Carlotta. Well then, I needn't tell you I'm 
fearfully nervous. You wouldn't expect anything 
else, would you, me being here like this, so sud- 
denly, and talking face to face with you? Per- 
haps I don't look it, but I hardly know what I'm 
saying. So you will understand, won't you.'^ 
[Diaz nods.'] [Insisting.] Whatever I say? 

Diaz. Why do you insist? We're friends. 

Carlotta [smiling]. I only insist because 
women are so much cruder than men, and I might 
say something 

Diaz [interrupting]. Are they so much cruder 
than men? Who told you that? 

Carlotta. Oh, I've noticed it. I mean in what 
they say. They aren't always honest, and yet 
they are honest — terribly. Men hate to admit 
things, but women like to. I know I do, even 
if it hurts me. And my aunt often tells me I'm 
crude. 

Diaz. But your aunt is a woman too. 

Carlotta. No, she's an old spinster. There 
I go, you see ! 

Diaz. Well now, after this exciting introduc- 
tion, what is it you're afraid I mightn't under- 
stand? 

Carlotta, Oh, but you will! It's only this. 



20 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

This evening's a miracle for me. I do so want 
to live it. I always feel people don't give them- 
selves up to the present enough. I know I'm 
always thinking about the next thing. Now, for 
instance, to-night — the train. There's over an 
hour to the train. I want to forget it till it's 
time for me to leave. I want to drench myself 
in my miracle. Let me. When I ask you to 
talk, don't remind me that I asked you to play. 
You can do both. But talk first. You don't 
know what it means to me. You say you under- 
stand. Do understand. You can't, but you 
must. I want to know you. I want to see inside 
you. I always have wanted. 

Diaz. But I thought you said on the way 
here you'd never heard me before. 

Carlotta, I hadn't. But — \_Stops, Then 
more quietly. 1 Tell me what your life is. 

Diaz, My life! My life is on the road — with 
Snape and a piano — sometimes a couple of pianos. 
I have three subjects of study, and I don't think 
I'm conceited in saying I know as much about 
those three vast and inexhaustible subjects as 
anybody on this earth. 

Carlotta. Yes. What are they? 

Diaz. Concert-halls, railway-trains, and hotels. 

Carlotta. Oh 1 

Diaz. Yes. I am always, always in one or an- 
other of them. And that is my life. 

Carlotta. But this isn't a hotel.'' 



ACT I 21 

Diaz, No. Now and then I get into such a 
state that I feel as if one more hotel, only one 
more, would drive me mad. Snape heard of this 
house, and it makes quite a piquant change. It's 
like a picnic into another century. Moreover, 
that piano is almost good. But to-morrow night 
will see me in a hotel again. Yes, to-morrow 
morning I shall lie in the bed there as long as I 
can, because I hate getting up, and then Snape 
will make me get up, and my belongings will be 
put into my two trunks, and before I leave the 
bedroom I shall look round and I shall say : "Sure 
you've put everything in, Snape?" and there will 
be nothing left in the bedroom that is mine, and 
I shall turn away, and do you know what I shall 
be thinking? I shall be thinking: "Well, I shall 
never sleep in that bed any more." And when 
I get to the station people will nudge each other 
and point out to each other that the great and 
glorious being, Diaz, is on the platform. And 
that's my life. 

Carlotta, But you do travel. Surely it must 
be wonderful to see fresh countries. I've never 
been out of England. 

Diaz. I never see fresh countries. I've seen 
them all, and I've seen them all several times — 
North America, South America, France, Germany, 
Austria, Italy, Russia, Spain. Snape and I are 
first-class authorities on the concert-halls, rail- 
way-trains and hotels of all of them. 



22 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta [tahing it in^ thoughtful]. Yes. . . . 
But wliat about foreign languages? You do 
hear and speak foreign languages. Don't you 
like doing that.?^ I should. I should like it more 
than anything — well, almost anything. All for- 
eign languages are so romantic. And when you 
speak them you feel proud, don't you.? I can't 
even speak French; I can only read it. Now 
you speak English simply marvellously. That's 
just what surprised me. Nobody could tell you 
aren't English. 

Diaz. Well, I am — nearly. English is really 
my only language. My mother was English, and 
my father was half English and half Spanish. He 
taught dancing in Dublin. Of course I never let 
on that I'm three-quarters English. If I did no- 
body would believe that I can play the piano. 

Carlotta. I can't bear to hear you talk like 
that. Now, tell me about your parents. 

Diaz. I'm an orphan. I mean — my father and 
mother are both dead. I hate the word orphan. 
There's something so sentimental about it. 

Carlotta. That's how I like to hear you talk ! 
That's exactly how I feel, but it never occurred 
to me anybody else felt the same. My father and 
mother are both dead. 

Diaz, Are they.? 

Carlotta. Yes — long ago. Before I can re- 
member. . . . And when auntie happens to men- 
tion that I'm an orphan, I squirm . . . [Softli/.l 



ACT I 23 

I won't ask you about your parents. Tell me 
about your friends. 

Diaz, Friends. Well, yes, I suppose I have 
one or two somewhere about the world. But you 
see they're like me — always imprisoned in concert- 
halls, railway-trains and hotels. We may meet 
now and then in a big city — never in a small one. 
We say, How d'ye do, how d'ye do, and pass on, 
because you know we haven't much spare time. 
We must practise. Play scales. Hours and 
hours. Every day. Wherever we are. We 
daren't leave off. And that is my life. 

Carlotta. But you have a home. I remember 
quite well reading about your palace in Fontaine- 
bleau. In fact I cut it out of the paper. 

Diaz. Not a palace. There is only one palace 
at Fontainebleau, and that's the palace where Na- 
poleon signed his abdication. Still, my place there 
is an agreeable and spacious abode, so far as I 
remember. I was in it seven months ago, for 
one night. I believe it is a paradise for the 
servants. 

Carlotta. And servants are so wasteful! 

Diaz, They are. But mine have every excuse. 
They can always read about my income in the 
papers, and they consider that some sustained 
effort ought to be made to spend it. 

Carlotta. I should hav^ thought you would 
have spent the summer in a place like Fontaine- 
bleau. I looked it up in the encyclopaedia. It 



M SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

must be lovely. You don't give concerts all sum- 
mer, do you? 

Diaz, Oh, no. I usually begin my summer in 
Fontainebleau, but after about a week or so I 
can't stand it any longer, and I go round the 
watering-places — Deauville, Ostend, anywhere — 
and do a little gambling. I enjoy gambling. It's 
my one recreation. . . . Why! Are those tears 
in your eyes.? 

Carlotta [successfully cheerfuT]. Yes — ^but 
they won't drop. [Grave again.^ It's very sad — 
I can't help saying it. 

Diaz, But I assure you I don't lose more in 
a whole summer than I can earn in a couple of 
days. 

Carlotta, Oh! I didn't mean the gambling. 
I think I should adore gambling. I meant 

Diaz, Yes. I see what you meant, but you 
asked me to tell you. Well, I've tried to alter 
it — and failed. Before my illness I had some 
plans for ameliorating the unhappy lot of a world- 
renowned pianist, but they didn't survive. 

Carlotta, Your illness was very serious, wasn't 
it? It was in all the papers. 

Diaz, They told me it was pretty bad. 

Carlotta, Who nursed you? 

Diaz, Nurses. 

Carlotta, And is it quite, quite gone, now? 

Diaz, Oh, yes. Quite. Except this [picking 
up a little case from a table']. 



ACT I 25 

Carlotta. What is that? 

Diaz, Morphine. 

Carlotta. Do you take it? 

Diaz. Sometimes. Inject it — subcutaneously. 
Done in a second. Doctor's advice — suggestion. 

Carlotta. But it's a drug, isn't it? 

Diaz. That's exactly what it is. 

Carlotta. When you've taken it you feel you 
are under it — under its influence. Something in 
you that's stronger than you. 

Diaz. Yes. 

Carlotta [commiseratingly, tenderly, not re- 
provingly']. How dreadful! \_With more vigour.^ 
I could not bear that, myself. I would sooner be 
ill. No, I could not bear it! 

Diaz \_rather apologetically^. We never know 
what we mayn't have to bear, do we? \_Linhtly.'\ 
Now I've told you what my life is. Admit you're 
disillusioned, horribly disillusioned. 

Carlotta {firmly and cheerfully']. I prefer to 
be disillusioned. 

Diaz [after looking at her']. You're a strange 
woman. 

Carlotta. Why am I strange? Is it strange 
to prefer to know the truth? If I have illusions 
I want to lose them — of course! The truth is 
always more romantic, really. All that you've 
told me is wonderful. Even if it's unhappy, it's 
wonderful. It's thrilling. It's more miraculous 
even than I thought it could be. And I can see 



26 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

now that it must be like that. But you haven't 
told me everything. 

Diaz. Haven't I? 

Carlotta, No. 

Diaz. Wliat haven't I told you? 

Carlotta. The most important thing. ... I 
hated to see all those silly hysterical women crowd- 
ing round the piano at the end of the concert 
to-night. \_AppeaUngl^.~\ You hated it too, 
didn't you? 

Diaz. I was in terror lest you should step up 
and join them. If you had done 

Carlotta [^shaking her head']. You might have 
been sure I never should. 

Diaz. How could I be sure? I didn't know 
you. 

Carlotta. Yes, you knew me. 

Diaz. Well, perhaps I did. 

Carlotta. Do you often have to go through 
that kind of — siege ? 

Diaz. Yes \lightly'], it's part of the routine. 

Carlotta. But — Now you said you'd under- 
stand. 

Diaz. Listen, young lady, do you want to dis- 
cuss the subject of love? 

Carlotta. Why not? We're perfect stran- 
gers. 

Diaz. Certainly that helps. But where do 
you stand in the matter? 



ACT I m 

Carlotta. I've read Shakespeare and Brown- 
ing. 

Diaz, Oh! That's nothing. 

Carlotta, You're quite right. It is nothing. 
But it's all. Till to-night I'd never once talked 
alone with a man, except at lawn-tennis or a 
dance — you know the sort of stuff. I thought 
you'd tell me something. {Pause. '\ Why shouldn't 
I know? The time will come when I shall know 
— everything. 

Diaz [gentlyl. Yes, but the time and the man 
who tells will come together. 

Carlotta [timid'\. Is it so? 

Diaz. It is so. 

Carlotta, Tell me just one thing. Is it worth 
while, love — honest Indian.? 

Diaz. I can't tell you. 

Carlotta, Now you're not understanding. 
You're being conventional — you think I'm morbid. 

Diaz. Honest Indian, I'm not. I canH tell you. 

Carlotta. But isn't there a woman who's made 
you tremendously happy or tremendously un- 
happy? — it doesn't matter which. 

Diaz. No, there isn't. 

Carlotta. Then it's true about you being 
nursed by nurses when you were ill? 

Diaz. Quite true. \Pause.'\ Another illusion 
gone. 

Carlotta. I don't like it to go. 

Diaz, Why? 



28 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta, I've always thought of you as- 



Diaz, Well, of course I'm not what you'd call 
an absolute stranger to the sex. 

Carlotta, Oh! I'm so glad. 

Diaz, Why? 

Carlotta. I doubt if a woman likes a man not 
to know a great deal of women — unless he's very, 
very young. 

Diaz. I don't remember that in either Shake- 
speare or Browning. 

Carlotta. Perhaps that's my own. 

Diaz. Tell me — I'm thirty-six. How old are 
you? 

Carlotta. Twenty-one — nearly. 

Diaz, And now tell me everything else. It's 
my turn to hold an inquiry. You play the piano. 

Carlotta. Yes, but don't let me give you a 
wrong idea. \_Eagerl^.'] Shall I tell you how 
I live? 

Diaz [lightly/']. After what has passed I think 
that's the least you can do. 

Carlotta. I live with auntie in a Queen Anne 
house, and there's a pretty large garden all round 
it. And all round the garden there are little 
streets of little shops and workpeople's cottages, 
rather dirty. From my bedroom window I can 
see into the valley, and I can see all the other 
hills scattered about, and there are factory chim- 
neys everywhere in the valley and on the horizon, 
and they never stop smoking, weekday or Sunday. 



ACT I 29 

Of course we ought to have gone to live right 
in the country long ago, like other people, but 
auntie doesn't care to move. Auntie is a witch. 
She doesn't look like one — she looks like a perfect 
churchwoman and member of the Soldiers and 
Sailors' Families Association, which she is — but 
she's a witch. She's put a spell on the house 
and on the garden as well, and on the servants 
and the gardeners and the coachman. Our house 
used to be in the open country — we've got en- 
gravings of it like that. It still is in the open 
country, so far as auntie is concerned. All the 
trees and things in the district except ours are 
dirty grey with smoke. Our trees are green. 
And what's stranger still, our window-curtains are 
white. It's auntie's spell. Our garden with the 
house in the middle is just like an island in the 
sea. The sea washes round the walls, and the 
tide gets higher and higher, but it never washes 
in. Do you see what I mean.? 

Diaz, Yes. 

Carlotta, Auntie thinks she's put her spell on 
me too. She doesn't really think she has, but 
she pretends to herself she has. And so I live 
there, and I'm very happy. I'm sad, but it's a 
happy sort of sadness, because auntie's frightfully 
fond of me, without understanding me a bit, and 
also because I'm waiting for something wonderful 
to occur, and I don't know what it is. I live all 
by myself in my head — ^nobody can see inside it. 



30 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

I read — ^lots. And I go in and out and in and out 
by the side gate, and the sea keeps washing in 
there — ^but that's a secret. Auntie doesn't know. 
Yes, I do play the piano — not what you^d call 
playing. Still, I do play. I play Chopin. I've 
got Mikuli's edition — it's the best, isn't it.^* Auntie 
gave it me. She never guessed she was giving 
me the key of all the world. You know when you 
read something about some one — some one that's 
alive — and instantly ^^ou've read it that person is 
somebody to you. That happened to you with 
me. I jelt that no one could play Chopin like you. 
Then I cut your photograph out of the Illustrated 
London News, and I put it in the Nocturnes, and 
when I'm playing alone I have it on the piano with 
me. That's why I know you so well. It's quite 
true — I like Chopin better than anything else in 
music, and I like music better than anything out- 
side music, but I'm not really a musician. I think 
I'm a writer. I seem somehow to be able to 
write. 

Diaz. What do you write .f^ 

Carlotta, I've written a novel about political 
life in London. 

Diaz, Then you've lived in London too. I 
thought you must have done. 

Carlotta. No, I haven't. I've never been there. 
You see I've just written my idea of what it is. 
Auntie knew in a vague sort of way that I was 
writing. But she didn't know I was writing a 



ACT I 31 

novel. And now something dreadful's occurred. 

Diaz. What's that? 

Carlotta, I got the novel typewritten and 
sent it to London, and it's been accepted! And 
I've got to tell auntie. 

Diaz. Really ! 

Carlotta. Yes, it may seem funny, but it's 
been accepted. 

Diaz. But surely all this must be the some- 
thing wonderful that you've been waiting to hap- 
pen to you in your spellbound garden! 

Carlotta [carelesslyl. Oh! It's very nice. 
But I don't call that wonderful. I knew that 
would happen sooner or later. I'm awfully con- 
ceited, you know — and yet I'm not. 

Diaz. Then what do you mean by "wonder- 
ful"? [Carlotta gives a baffled gesture.l The 
subject has already been mentioned — do you mean 
love ? 

Carlotta. No. Not specially. It might be. 
But then it mightn't. 

Diaz. Well, in your sense of the word "won- 
derful," what's the most wonderful thing that's 
happened to you up to now? 

Carlotta [after reflecting']. Shall I tell you? 

Diaz. Do. 

Carlotta [witli feeling^, . . . When you had the 
piano moved in the middle of the concert, so 
that you could see me better while you played. 



32 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

... I shall never be the same girl again. I'm 
another girl. ... I must go. 

Diaz. No, no ! Remember about living in the 
present. The train is a long way off. 

Carlotta. It will be terrible when I get home. 
Auntie will have sent the carriage back to the 
station for me, on the chance of me being on the 
mail-train. Thank goodness she won't be at the 
station. I told a frightful lie so that I could 
come to the concert to-night. Auntie had bought 
two tickets, and then this afternoon she says she's 
feeling very unwell and I can't possibly go alone. 
You don't know how I felt. I'd been living at 
your concert for a month past. I could have 
died — really. I sent up a note to Ethel Ryley — 
a school friend of mine who's just got married 
— and I implored her to go with me. She wrote 
back to say she couldn't. So I told auntie she'd 
written to say she could go, and I was to meet 
her at the station. Auntie was in bed by that 
time. I shall have to go up to auntie's bedroom 
as soon as ever I get home, and if she's asleep I 
shall have to wake her and tell her — about all 
this. 

Diaz, But must you? 

Carlotta. Must I! I always pay the price — 
cash! And I always will. There's something in 
me that makes me. And I like to. 

Diaz [looking at her with admiration, rather 
wistfullyl. You are — strong! But now you 



ACT I 33 

really ought to take something. Please do — be- 
fore I play. {^He moves to the table where the 
food is.^ 

Carlotta [trying to change her mood to light- 
7iess'\. Ought I? [She follows him.l 

Diaz. Let me see. Will you have some fowl? 

Carlotta, Oh! Wliat perfectly marvellous 
cake! What sort of cake is it? 

Diaz [loohing at the sliced roly-poly~\, I don't 
know. Snape doesn't usually get cake at all. We 
eat together after concerts, he and I. He seems 
to have surpassed himself to-night. I've never 
seen any cake like that cake. 

Carlotta. May I help myself? 

Diaz, Please. [Begins to pour out drinl<;s.^ 

Carlotta [biting into the jam roly-poly; dis- 
illusioned']. Why, it's only cold jam roly-poly 
with sugar on it ! 

Diaz, Never! I'll make Snape swallow every 
crumb of it, as a punishment for putting this 
shame upon me. 

Carlotta [recovering herself quicMyl. But I 
just love it. . . . Only I can't really eat to-night. 
. . . No thanks, nothing to drink. 

Diaz, Well, then, I can't either. 

Carlotta [with sudden curtness]. Well, then, 
play. 

Diaz. What would you like me to play? 

Carlotta [appealingly, with emotion imper- 
fectly restrained]. Don't ask me to decide. 



34 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Diaz [becoming rather masterftilj. But you 
must. 

Carlotta [still more appealingly, looking up at 
him']. Please! [Pause.] I couldn't choose, even 
if your playing or not playing depended on it. 
You don't realize. You don't know how I feel — 
how I felt at the concert. You couldn't. When 
you plaj^ — I receive. I'm — Pm like a vase. Shall 
the vase — choose.'^ 

Diaz [turning abruptly away, and then speaJc- 
ing], I'll play something for a room. Chamber 
music. Not for the concert-hall. The conditions 
are different. [Looking at her as he approaches 
the piano.] The influence of the artist is so much 
more personal and effective — in a room. 

Carlotta [feebly]. You make me afraid. 
[She sits down so that she is screened from the 
player by the piano, Diaz sits down at the 
piano.] 

Diaz [without loohimg at her]. Not there, 

Carlotta, Yes. I like this seat. 

Diaz [in a tremulous, sharp tone, without look- 
ing at her]. No. I cannot see you. Come over 
here, please, where I can see you. [Looking at 
her,] I am used to seeing you while I play. 
[Carlotta changes her seat.] 

Carlotta [nervously]. Chopin.? 
[Diaz nods, and drags his chair a little forward* 
Carlotta settles herself in her seat, clearing 
her throat. The pianist's hands are lifted 



ACT I 35 

over the Taeyhoard. Then there are very faint 
noises of Mrs. Joicey and Louisa outside. 
They are going up to the second story. 
Their voices are subdued. Mrs. Joicey^s 
voice is heard, and the words just distin- 
guished: "/ tell you she*s gone.'' Carlotta 
gives a nervous start, listening. The noises 
outside, always faint, die away. Absolute 
silence. Carlotta leans back, relieved. 

Diaz begins to play the Revolutionary 
Study of Chopin [op. 25, No. 11]. After 
about twenty bars Carlotta springs up, with 
a violent and forbidding gesture towards the 
pianist. He stops playing and hurries for- 
ward. The atmosphere of the scene suddenly 
becomes intensely emotional.'] 
Diaz, What is the matter? 
Carlotta [now and henceforward with somewhat 
of the mature bearing of a fully grown woman], I 
cannot bear it. 

Diaz, But what is the matter? 
Carlotta, It is too beautiful. [She falls bacfc 
into her chair as if exhausted.] It's too beautiful, 
I tell you. 

Diaz [with ecstatic realization of the effect of 
the music on her.] Does my playing affect you 
like that? [She nods.] You are marvellous. 

Carlotta. No, it's not I that am marvellous. 
It's you that are marvellous. When you were 
describing your life you left out all that. 



36 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Diaz, All what? 

Carlotta. All the beautiful part ! All the sen- 
sations you produce ! All the power over others ! 
You must know there's nothing equal to it in the 
whole world. Don't you ? Don't you realize what 
an autocrat you are? 

Diaz \_appealinglt/'\. And yet — You have 
divined how I suffer, and how tragic my life is! 

Carlotta [rising; bravely^. Yes. 

Diaz [passionately^. Never on this earth have 
I met a woman like you ! . . . Who are you ? 

Carlotta [after a slight pause'], I told you 
my name. 

Diaz [gazing at her,] Enchantress! [Kisses 
her hand.] 

Carlotta [looMng at her hand; humbly^ 
deprecatingly]. Not that! 

Diaz, And why not? 

Carlotta [in another tone, stepping hack *vir- 
ginally]. It is too sudden. I have admired ard 
understood you for years, without having seen 
you. But you — you never even knew of my ex- 
istence until to-night. 

Diaz. Listen! I will tell you something mys- 
terious and inexplicable. The most beautiful 
things and the most vital things and the most 
lasting things — come suddenly. 

Carlotta [hesitating]. I am helpless. 

Diaz. You ! With your character ! It is your 
strength that I have envied. . . . Give it to me. 



ACT I 37 

Carlotta [half to herself^. Why should I be 
afraid of my miracle? 

\_Diaz takes her hand again to kiss it. She 

withdraws it.~\ 
Carlotta, Kiss higher than the hand. 
{^Thei/ emhrace.l 

CURTAIN. 



SCENE II 

The same room the next morning. Louisa on her 
knees at the fireplace is clearing the ashes 
from the grate. The room is full of the cold, 
dim, blue light of dawn. 

Enter Carlotta from the hack, stealthily. She 
starts at seeing Louisa, and Louisa also 
starts. 

Louisa \_recovering hers elf 1. Good morning! 

Carlotta \_excited and tiery nervous^. Hush! 
He's asleep. 

Louisa \lo'wer'\. Is he! Better shut the door, 
then, if you don't want to wake him. \She rises 
and shuts the door which Carlotta has left ajar.^ 
Now! . . . [benevolent and curious^, I knew you 
hadn't gone. 

Carlotta. Will you do something for me .^^ Lend 
me a hat. 

Louisa [staggered}. A hat.'' 

Carlotta. Yes. One of your own. Anything 
will do. I'll pay you whatever you want for it. 

Louisa. I've got three. I should think my last 
year's straw would suit you best. 

Carlotta, Yes, yes! Please! Quick! You 



ACT I 39 

see I must go — now, at once. And I can't pos- 
sibly be seen in the street without something on 
my head. 

Louisa [fo herself as she leaves roomy L]. Talk 
about swallowing a camel and straining at a gnat ! 
Stops out all night, but she can't possibly be 
seen in the street without a hat. 
[Carlotta looks for her cloak, finds it, and puts it 
on, and stands waiting. Re-enter Louisa with 
a straw hat, which Carlotta snatches at.'\ 

Louisa [^as she watches Carlotta putting on the 
hat at the mirror^. Yes. It'll do. My sister 
always did say it was too young for me. But 
I'm glad I bought it, now. It's a good thing it 
was me and not my sister that was in here. My 
sister's very narrow, my sister is. I'm different. 
I don't know what would have become of me if 
it hadn't been for my sister. I should have been 
a oner! 

Carlotta, I'm frightfully obliged to you. How 
much is it, please .^^ 

Louisa, Nay! Ye're very welcome. I can 
easil}^ make up a tale to my sister. 

Carlotta, But I should prefer to pay. 

Louisa, Yes. I daresay you would. But you 
see you can't. 

Carlotta, You're very kind. 

Louisa, Well, I'm like that. 

Carlotta, Will you undo the front door for 
me? 



40 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Louisa, Front door's open. We always open 
it first thing to air the house. Just slip quietly 
down the stairs and it's in front of you. And 
look here — \_very kindly^ I've not seen you. I've 
seen nothing. 

Carlotta [at the door^. Thank you! You're 
awfully good-natured. 

Louisa [with a break in her voice']. Well, I'm 
like that. And you're so young. 

[Ea:it Carlotta, l.] 
\_Louisa bursts into tears.] 

CUETAIN. 



ACT II 

Drawing-room of Carlotta^s -flat in Bloomshury. 
Doors R. leading to hall, and l. leading to 
houdoir. Window centre back, with view of 
roofs, etc., indicating that the flat is on an 
upper story. Furnished with genuine taste. 
A grand piano, with a cabinet photograph of 
Diaz on it, vn a leather frame. 

Time: Afternoon, 

Over seven years have passed, 

Carlotta is alone. 

Enter Jocelyn and Lord Francis Alcar. 

Lord Francis. Good afternoon, Miss Peel. 
You must blame Jocelyn for bringing me here. 

Carlotta. How nice of you to come, Lord 
Francis ! Jocelyn, I shall richly reward you. 

Jocelyn [kissing Carlotta^. Well, I'll tell you 
in a minute how you can richly reward me. I 
was coming along here in the new car because I 
was dying to see you, and in Piccadilly I overtook 
Lord Francis showing off his beautiful new suit 
to an admiring world. And he said he wanted to 
come too. 

41 



42 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Lord Francis, It was an opportunity not to 
be missed. And my desire to look at you and 
listen to you got the better of my fear of the 
imperfectly tamed monster that this young woman 
calls the new car. 

Jocelyn. Imperfectly tamed ! Why, it will eat 
out of my hand ! Now, Miss Peel, I've got a very 
serious piece of news for you. 

Carlotta. Well, let's sit down. [They sit.'] 

Jocelyn [^seriously]. Mother's paying a call on 
you this afternoon [with relief], but she won't be 
here just yet. I'm getting my shot in first. 

Carlotta. I shall be delighted to see your 
mother. 

Jocelyn. Oh ! You are awful, Miss Peel. 

Carlotta. Why? 

Jocelyn. No one could possibly be delighted 
to see mother. Do you know, when I refused to 
go to church last Sunday father said it didn't 
matter because we always had a church in the 
house. He meant mother. And mother is really 
rather like a church. 

Lord Francis, I see already that this is no 
place for me. I've wandered by mistake into 
the wrong generation. 

Jocelyn. And what's more — I think Mrs. 
Ispenlove's coming, too. We passed her in Caro- 
line Street, and she had a look on her face just 
as if she was going to pay a state visit to her 
husband's principal author. Mother says the 



ACT II 43 

Ispenloves have gone into their new house simply 
on the strength of your books. Of course mother 
always has a fearful down on publishers, but I 
do think there's something in it as regards the 
Ispenloves. Every one says Mr. Ispenlove must 
have made thousands and thousands out of your 
books, Miss Peel. ... I seem to be doing all 
the talking. . . . 

Carlotta. But we love it, don't we, Lord 
Francis ? 

Lord Francis, Without doubt. Do conquer 
your diffidence, Jocelyn. 

Jocelyn, Well now, about that reward. 

Carlotta. What reward? 

Jocelyn, I like that! You said you would 
richly reward me for bringing Lord Francis, and 
you've forgotten all about it already! [Coax- 
ingly.'] I'll tell you what I want, Miss Peel. 
Mother won't let me read your novels. Do make 
her. I'm particularly dying to read "The Cur- 
tain." That's really what I came about. You 
could speak to her when she comes. 

Carlotta, But why won't she let you read 
them? 

Jocelyn. She says they — aren't for me. What 
I say is — they're much more for me than they 
are for her. 

Carlotta. How do you know that? 

Jocelyn. Well, aren't they frightfully ad^ 
vanced? As a matter of fact I know they are. 



U SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta, Now, Jocelyn, do please be a woman 
of the world. 

Jocelyn, But I am. 

Carlotta. Are you? A woman of the world 
exercises her imagination. A woman of the world 
would see that you are putting me in an im- 
possible position. How can I say to your 
mother: "Mrs. Sardis, I understand you refuse 
to let your daughter Jocelyn read my novels. I 
beg you not to let this occur again." I assure 
you that modern lady novelists [with irony on 
the phrase"} do not talk to each other in that 
way. 

Jocelyn, I see what you mean. I never thought 
of that. 

Lord Francis, You've got all your mother's 
books to read. 

Jocelyn, I've read 'em. 

Lord Francis, Then she lets you read her own 
novels ? 

Jocelyn, There's no letting about it. I jolly 
well have to. Worse luck! I never could under- 
stand mother's popularity. Father can't either. 
[To Carlotta.} Then you can't do anything 
for me? You couldn't just hint . . .? 

Carlotta, I hate hints. 

Jocelyn. Oh! So do I! Well, all right then. 
Do you know what I shall do ? I shall go straight 
to Hatchards, and I shall buy "The Curtain," out 



ACT II 45 

of my own hard-earned, and I shall take it home, 
and I shall tear the cover off it. 

Carlotta. Oh, Jocelyn! 

Jocelyn, Yes, and I shall tear the cover off 
one of mother's books, and I shall stickphast your 
book inside mother's covers, and I shall flaunt it 
in front of her. And she'll think I'm reading her 
silly old thing twice over — which heaven forbid! 
. . . Now I've finished. Lord Francis. You can 
have your turn. I do want to hear you and Miss 
Peel talk. 

Lord Francis, No, Jocelyn ! No ! I see 
plainly now that I made a mistake in letting you 
bring me here. I ought to have come alone. 

Jocelyn. Then you won't talk in front of me. 
You'll trust your very life to a turn of my wrist 
in Piccadilly Circus, but you won't talk because 
I'm here. I must say I'm getting a bit fed up. 

Lord Francis [protesting against all this Ian- 
guage]. Remember, my child, that you are in the 
presence of a very distinguished woman. 

Carlotta [sympathetically']. Don't you detest 
distinguished people, Jocelyn.^ 

Jocelyn, Oh, I do! They're ten a penny in 
our house. Mother's been translated into nine 
languages — [A parrot screams o^.] What's 
that.? 

Carlotta. It's the parrot, back from the vet's. 
I expect Miss Palmer's feeding it. 

Jocelyn. In the boudoir.? 



46 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Jocelyn. Can I go and look at it? 

Carlotta. Do. 

Jocelyn, I adore Miss Palmer. She isn't cele- 
brated. 

Lord Francis, Miss Palmer.? 

Carlotta. My secretary. 

Jocelyn, The ever-faithful Emmeline! [On 
the way out.^ Whose is this portrait that's al- 
ways on the piano.'' 

Carlotta. It's a famous pianist. 

Jocelyn. Did you know him.'' 

Carlotta [evenly, after a slight pause'\. I only 
met him once in my life — years ago. 

Jocelyn. Why do you have his portrait always 
on the piano.? 

Carlotta, Well, you see, he could play the 
piano. 

Jocelyn. What's his name.? 

Carlotta. Diaz — Emilio Diaz. 

Jocelyn. I never heard of him. 

Lord Francis. Such is fame. 
\_Ewit Jocelyn, l. with a charmingly impudent 
bow to Lord Francis.'] 

Lord Francis [indicating Jocelyn']. And you 
were like that once.? 

Carlotta. I wonder. 

Lord Francis. More or less. 

Carlotta. I should say rather less than more. 

Lord Francis. But you know what I mean.? 



ACT II 47 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Lord Francis. And how long since is it? 

Carlotta. Since what? Since I was a young 
girl — within the meaning of the Act? It's diffi- 
cult to say. 

Lord Francis. Why? 

Carlotta. Because when you're a young girl 
you don't know j^ou are. You don't find out till 
afterwards, and often quite a long time after- 
wards. If you tried to persuade Jocelyn that 
she's all that 7/ou mean by a young girl, you'd 
fail. She's convinced that people older than 
herself have a great deal to learn, and she feels 
disillusioned because once she hoped to be able 
to teach them a thing or two, whereas now she 
knows they're too stupid to learn. That's 
Jocelyn's picture of herself. There are no young 
girls. There never were any — in your sense. 

Lord Francis. Dear me! And I thought this 
conversation would be so simple ! Well, never 
mind. Let me lead you quietly back to the point. 
How long is it since you were more or less like 
Jocelyn? Ten years? 

Carlotta. Oh, no ! Perhaps — well, seven. 

Lord Francis. And what brought about the 
change ? 

Carlotta. Is this jiist curiosity, Lord Francis, 
or personal interest? 

Lord Francis. Impersonal interest. I'm an 
old man, a very old man — over eighty. I'm in- 



48 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

different to everything, except food and warmth. 
I've nothing to gain and scarcely anything to 
lose. I don't live. I survive. My sole hobby is 
facts — about human nature. I don't divide facts 
into categories. Anybody may tell me anything 
without troubling to blush. I can offer to my 
friends the rare luxury of shameless candour, 
combined with absolute ease and safety. 

Carlotta. It's terrifying, but it's tempting. 

Lord Francis. Ah! You understand! Tell 
me. You live alone. Have you no relatives? 

Carlotta. Not since my aunt died. She died 
very suddenly. I went to a concert; and when I 
got home I found her dead. 

Lord Francis. Maiden aunt.? 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Lord Francis. I suppose you were about 
twenty then. 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Lord Francis. What sort of a concert ? 

Carlotta. Piano recital. Chopin. 

Lord Francis. And after that you were by 
yourself ? 

Carlotta. I came to London. 

Lord Francis. With the manuscript of your 
first novel in your trunk. 

Carlotta. No. That went first. Luggage in 
advance. Mr. Ispenlove had already bought it. 
I threw myself at the Ispenloves. They gave me 
my first lessons in the great subject of London* 



ACT II 49 

I took this flat, wrote another novel — two more, 
took a secretary — wrote three more novels, bought 
a parrot 

Lord Francis. The parrot is a disturbing 
sign. 

Carlotta. Yes, it is. But not so disturbing 
as cats would be. Then I wrote another novel. 
Indeed I finished it only yesterday. I've written 
eight novels in eight years, and made more money 
than I can spend. And there you are! 

Lord Francis. But you've explained nothing 
— nothing whatever — about the change from 
somebody more or less like Jocelyn — to you. 

Carlotta, Haven't 1? Still, everything hap- 
pened just like that. 

Lord Francis. Now listen to the detached and 
frigid spectator. I've read your books. And I 
think you've explained the two sexes to each other 
just about as well as any novelist ever did. I 
turn from the books to their author, and I find 
a young creature who lived alone with a maiden 
aunt until she was twenty, and then lived alone 
with a parrot and a female clerk, and wrote eight 
long books in eight years, and became extremely 
famous. . . . There's something wrong with the 
equation. . . . [/7^ a more intimate tone.'] Where 
did you get it all from.^ 

Carlotta. All what.? 

Lord Francis. All that's in your admirable 
but disconcerting books. . . . Out of your head.'* 



50 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta. I suppose so. 

Lord Francis. Or out of your heart? 

Carlotta. Lord Francis, you said you were 
very old; but let me warn you — you're getting 
dangerously younger every second. 

Lord Francis. No. You are mistaking the 
signs. I'm getting older every second. The aged 
sometimes have a strange desire. I have it and 
occasionally it excites me. Nincompoops call it 
senile inquisitiveness, but it's really the desire to 
take into the next world all possible knowledge 
of this. . . . Might be useful, you see. 

Carlotta. Yes, it might. But there are some 
little bits of information that the next world 
will just have to do without. 

Lord Francis, Then it was the heart. I felt 
sure of it. 

Carlotta. I never said so. 

Lord Francis. Yes, you did. I understand. 
It was the heart — when you were twenty. Since 
then you have taken to writing as some women 
take to drugs. And it has obtained such a hold 
of you that you cannot do without it. 

Carlotta. On the contrary, I have determined 
to do no more work for twelve months. 

Lord Francis. Seriously? 

Carlotta. Quite. 

Lord Francis. Then you mean to give your- 
self to love — again. 

Carlotta. Oh! . . . Do you advise it? 



ACT II 51 

Lord Francis [coldly'\. I absolutely prescribe 
it. [With growing passion.^ I said I was indif- 
ferent to everything except food and warmth. 
But there's one thing that still arouses me. It's 
the sight of a young and beautiful woman grow- 
ing older in solitude without noticing that she 
is growing older. Waste! Horrible waste! 
Against nature! You're beautiful — lovely. You 
have temperament. You were born for love. 
And you are prostituting yourself to — novels. 
Repent ! It's dangerous. But repent ! Risk un- 
happiness and disaster. But repent! The best 
years are almost gone. 

Carlotta, You came to tell me this. 

Lord Francis [coZJZ^]. I did, I regard it as 
my privilege. 

Enter Mrs, Sardis and Mrs, Ispenlove, r. 

Mrs, Sardis [as she comes in, before Carlotta 
has quite recovered her equanimityl, Mrs. Is- 
penlove and I joined forces in the lift. How do 
you do.^^ 

Lord Francis [aside to Carlotta, as he slowly 
rises^. Another brace for you. 

Mrs, Ispenlove [nervouslyl. Well, Carlotta. 
I only looked in for a moment. 

Mrs, Sardis, Ah ! Lord Francis. 
[The two new visitors shake hands with Carlotta, 
and Mrs, Sardis with Lord Francis Alcar.'] 

Carlotta. So nice of you to call. I didn't 



52 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

know that you and Mrs. Ispenlove knew each 
other. Lord Francis Alcar — Mrs. Ispenlove. 
l^Lord Francis sits down apart, showing no in- 
terest whatever in the talk.'] 

Mrs, Sardis. Oh, yes ! We met once at a 
dinner 

Carlotta, I see. 

Mrs. Sardis. Of the Publishing Trade Benev- 
olent Society. And had quite a pleasant chat 
about trade matters. I remembered Mrs. Ispen- 
love perfectly. How is that clever husband of 
yours, Mrs. Ispenlove.? 

Mrs. Ispenlove [^controlling her nervousness]. 
Very well, but very busy. 

Mrs, Sardis. Thanks largely no doubt to the 
books of our friend [indicating Carlotta], 1 
always say — what a godsend it must be to a 
publisher, even if he is a pushing man, when he 
finds an author whose books the public will insist 
on buying — in spite of the strange business 
methods of publishers. And yet some publishers 
aren't satisfied with taking nearly all the money, 
they want all the glory, too. I know I left my 
last publisher because he always gave the impres- 
sion that in addition to publishing my books — he 
wrote them. 

[During the foregoing Jocelyn enters,] 

Jocelyn [very demure and submissive]. Oh, 
mother darling! 

Mrs. Sardis, No doubt, my child. But you 



ACT II 53 

ought to have told your mother where you were 
going. You might have brought me. I had to 
come in a taxi, and when I arrive I find my own 
car at the door. 

Jocelyn. Oh, mother darling, I didn't know. 
Lord Francis asked me to give him a lift. 

Mrs, Sardis [sweetly']. Ah! In that case 

Lord Francis [coldly]. Is that my chauffeur? 
[Rising,] Please take me back at once to the 
precise spot in Piccadilly from which you ab- 
ducted me. [To Carlotta.] Good-bye, dear lady. 

Carlotta, But you'll have some tea, Lord 
Francis. 

Lord Francis, No, I thank you. [Shakes 
hands.] 

Carlotta, Why not.? 

Lord Francis, I never have tea in my 
friends' drawing-rooms now. It makes me feel 
as if I was on the stage. Tea has been served in 
every play I've seen for the last ten years. It 
was not so in my younger days. These modern 
dramatists have made tea impossible for decent 
people. 

Jocelyn [very prim]. Oh, how do you do, 
Mrs. Ispenlove? 

Mrs, Ispenlove, My dear! [They shake 
hands.] 

Jocelyn. We often meet here, don't we? I 
see Mr. Ispenlove has just published a book 
about the Breton peasant. We're going to 



54 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Brittany in August, and I shall read it if 
mother thinks it wise for me to study the con- 
dition of the lower classes in France. May I, 
mother darling? 

Mrs. Sardis. Certainly, my child. 

Jocelyn. Good afternoon. Miss Peel. It was 
kind of you to let me see your adorable parrot. 
[^Shahes hands, hows to Mrs, Ispenlove.'] You 
coming, mother ? 

Mrs. Sardids. No, my child. Take great care 
of Lord Francis. 

Lord Francis [turning back from the door, to 
Jocelyn~\. Have you got a driving licence ? 

Jocelyn. Oh, yes. Lord Francis. I've had 
one for eight months. I'm nearly nineteen. 

Carlotta. Good-bye. 
[^Exeunt Lord Francis and Jocelyn, r. As she 
leaves, Jocelyn gives a youthful McJc in the 
air.'\ 

Mrs. Ispenlove. I must go, too. 

Carlotta [^turning to her from the departing 
guests']. Not yet. Not yet. 

Mrs, Ispenlove [preoccupied]. Yes. I called 
at the office to see Frank, but he wasn't in. I 
thought he might have run up here for a cup of 
tea [Carlotta shakes her head], and as it was on 
my way — Good-day, Mrs. Sardis. 

Carlotta. Mr. Ispenlove hasn't been here for 
at least a week — not since I saw you last. 

Mrs, Sardis [to Mrs. Ispenlove]. Good after- 



ACT II 65 

noon. I hope we may meet again — perhaps at 
the next annual dinner of the Publishing Trade 
Benevolent Society. 

Carlotta [as Mrs, Ispenlove suddenly Jcisse^ 
Tier'], Well, you are in a hurry. 

[Exit Mrs. Ispenlove quickly.] 

Carlotta. I'll ring for tea. [Moving towards 
mantelpiece.] 

Mrs, Sardis, Please don't. Tea means ser- 
vants, and I want to speak to you quite privately. 

Carlotta [returning]. I have always under- 
stood that social life in London was founded on 
the axiom that servants are stone deaf by pro- 
fession. 

Mrs, Sardis. It may be; but the sight of 
their ears is disturbing. However, Miss Peel, I 
did not come for dialogue, which we can both 
compose so well in our different ways. I wish to 
talk to you about — [Breaking off and beginning 
again.] I'm thirty years older than you. 

Carlotta, No one would think it. 

Mrs, Sardis, When I'm dead you will in- 
evitably take my place. 

Carlotta. Take your place, Mrs. Sardis ? 
Do you know that you are alarming me.'' 

Mrs, Sardis, Let us be frank. Between col- 
leagues false modesty is out of place. I am the 
leader of English fiction to-day. Not merely the 
leading woman novelist, but the leading novelist. 
I have been for twenty years, and I shall be until 



56 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

I die or until I — relinquish the pen. Why pre- 
tend to ignore what is universally admitted? As 
Mr. Gladstone said, there is no question of rivalry 
— there cannot be. But when I am gone my 
mantle — if I may use the term — will fall on you. 

Carlotta [glancing at Mrs, Sardis' attirel. 
Will it? 

Mrs. Sardis, Unquestionably. You too have 
genius. And for the second time in succession 
the leadership of the greatest modern art will 
be held by a woman. A proud thought for 
our sex — although, mind you, I am a convinced 
opponent of women's suffrage. Now, Miss Peel, 
I admire your work extremely. At first I had 
my mental reservations — but the immense 
popular appreciation which you have received 
has done away with them entirely. 

Carlotta. That is very nice, but surely your 
judgment isn't influenced by popular apprecia- 
tion, is it? 

Mrs. Sardis. Of course it is. My dear — the 
great public is always right. Look at my own 
case. 

Carlotta [convinced'\. Just so. But 

Airs. Sardids, Pardon me. Let me come to 
my point. Now — [stoppingi — may I call you 
Carlotta? 

Carlotta. Please do, Mrs. Sardis. 

Mrs. Sardis. Let me offer you a little advice, 
my dear, dear Carlotta. I know the public. 



ACT II 57 

The public will accept any amount of — er — 
unconventionality in your novels — you have 
already taught it to do so — but only on one 
condition. Namely, that there is no suspicion 
of — er — unconventionality in your private life. 

Carlotta \_simpli/'\, I see. The public won't 
mind what I say so long as it thinks I don't 
know what I am talking about. If it has reason 
to suppose that I do know what I'm talking 
about, then it will cease to respect me. 

Mrs. Sardis [very seriouslyl. Exactly! You 
have stated the case with all your accustomed 
epigrammatic lucidity. ... I needn't tell you, 
my dear girl, that I don't for a single moment 
suspect you of — ^knowledge. You have genius. 
That is enough. You and I know how novels are 
written. Nevertheless — forgive me — the tongue 
of scandal is at work. I am your true friend and 
I have come to warn you. 

Carlotta, Is this the result of my Sunday 
golf? 

Mrs. Sardis, My dear Carlotta, your name is 
being connected with that of Mr. Ispenlove ! 

Carlotta [startled, hut controlling herself^, 
Mr. Ispenlove.'' 

Mrs. Sardis. Your publisher! Oh, I am 
sure you are utterly innocent. If I was not sure 
of that my daughter would not be a visitor to this 
charming flat of yours. Probably your very 
innocence is responsible for the — er — artless un- 



58 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

conventionality which has given rise to the tale. 
[Reassuringly.'] You need not be apprehensive. 
The danger is already at an end. I have myself 
denied the slander. But there is a lesson in the 
incident. [With real emotion,] Carlo tta, I am 
very jealous for the honour of our high vocation. 
And my desire is that when our biographies come 
to be written, yours and mine, no page shall be 
stained by even a rumour. And may I add just 
one word ? I personally have nothing against 
Mr. Ispenlove. I am ready to believe that he is 
an excellent man, and that you think you owe a 
great deal to him. But my experience has taught 
me that purely formal relations are best — with 
one's publishers. 

Carlotta [enigmatically']. Thank you, Mrs. 
Sardis. It would be impossible for me to tell 
you what value I attach to your candour — and 
your courage. 

Mrs, Sardis, Not at all. [Nonchalantly,] I 
am full of sympathy for Mrs. Ispenlove, poor 
woman ! 

Carlotta, Really? 

Mrs, Sardis, And I noticed you kissed her. 
That at any rate would alone dispose of 

Carlotta [firmly]. No. I didn't kiss her. 
She kissed me. And it was the first time. [She 
gazes steadily at Mrs, Sardis.] 

Mrs. Sardis [after a pause, disturbed]. Oh! 



ACT n 59 

Carlotta. Why are you so sorry for Mrs. 
Ispenlove ? 

Mrs. Sardis. Mr. Ispenlove has been the 
topic of conversation before . . . before ever you 
came to London. 

Carlotta [aroused]. He is a friend of mine, 
and I must ask you 

Mrs. Sardis [after a pauuse, still more dis- 
turbed']. Oh! 

[Enter Frank Ispenlove, r, rather dishevelled. 
He makes a gesture toward Carlotta before 
catching sight of Mrs. Sardis.] 

Mrs. Sardis. Mr. Ispenlove! 
[Overwhelmed by sudden and terrible suspicions, 
she bows gravely, and goes out in silence, e.] 
[A pause.], 

Carlotta. What is the matter.'' Do you 
know your necktie is all crooked? 

Ispenlove [in a voice harsh with emotion]. Ah! 
If you turn against me to-day, I shall — I don't 
know what I shall do. 

Carlotta. Turn against you! . . . Let me 
straighten it for you. 

Ispenlove [dropping his hat; as she straightens 
the necktie]. It's finished between Mary and 
me ! . . . It's finished ! I've no one but you 

now, and I've come — I've come 

[Carlotta, having straightened the necktie, pats 
it. They look at each other. She holds out 
her hand. Instead of taking it, Ispenlove 



60 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

suddenly hisses her. For an instant Car- 
lot t a seems to resent the kiss. Then she re- 
lents.l 

Ispenlove [holding her hand^. I can't believe 
it! 

Carlotta [gravely"]. Why not? 

Ispenlove. Ever since yesterday I've been 
trying to come here, and I daren't. And I've 
been trying to think how I should say it, and I 
couldn't. And I've said nothing, and I've kissed 
you. [Carlotta nods.] A minute ago I was so 
miserable, I was in such a state — anything might 
have happened to me. 

Carlotta. Poor boy! 

Ispenlove. Now everything's all right. It 
seems as if I hadn't a care. Well, I haven't. 
You do love me? [Carlotta nods.] Say it, say 
it! . . . You aren't just taking pity on me. 
[Carlotta shakes her head with a sad smile.] I've 
always been in /love with you — ever since that 
day you called at my office about your manu- 
script — your first day in London — and I drove 
you back to your hotel. I shall never forget the 
feel of being in the taxi with you. I didn't sleep 
all night — couldn't, didn't want to. I wouldn't 
have gone to sleep for anything. You see 
I couldn't bear not to be thinking about 
you. 

Carlotta. You dear thing! How beauti- 
fully you tell me I 



ACT II 61 

Ispenlove, But you haven't always been in 
love with me, 

Carlotta, No. 

Ispenlove, Then when did you — when did 
you first — I'm dying to know. 

Carlotta, 1 didn't notice myself for a long 
time. But when you told me that the end of 
"The Curtain" was not as good as I could make 
it — do yon remember that afternoon in your 
office? — you were so shy about critising me, you 
were afraid to — your throat went dry and you 
stroked your forehead as you always do when 
you're nervous. There, you're doing it now, 
foolish boy! It was brave of you to tell me. 
Mind, you were wrong about the end of that 
book. I altered it to please you, quite against 
my conscience. I enjoyed altering it, and when 
I'd altered it I began to guess how fond of you I 
was. . . . That was it. 

Ispenlove. It's incredible. Incredible! It 
passes comprehension! 

Carlotta, Well, of course, dear! That's just 
what love does. Didn't you know.^* It's just 
the same for me as it is for you. 

Ispenlove, No, no! You don't understand, 
you can't understand, how I felt when I first 
began to suspect that I really meant something 
to you. I'm nobody. I can't talk. I can't 
write. I can't play. I can't do anything. And 



62 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

look at some of the fellows who come here! Fm 
nothing but a rotten publisher. 

Carlotta. You are you! That was what 
seemed to be always the miracle to me, whenever 
we sat in your little private office, going through 
proofs and things — or pretending to. 

Ispenlove {^reflective^. What marvellous after- 
noons we have had! 

Carlotta. Yes. It appears that they have 
caused remark. 

Ispenlove. Caused remark? How? 

Carlotta, I don't know. You saw Mrs. 
Sardis. She came to warn me that scandal had 
started. However, she's thoroughly convinced of 
our innocence. She was superb. 

Ispenlove. But we'd done nothing. 

Carlotta. Yes, we had. We'd fallen in love. 
Your clerks noticed my visits to the office. Do 
you suppose publishers' clerks aren't human? 
Do you suppose they're blind — or dumb? Do 
you suppose they don't know what being in love 
is themselves? 

Ispenlove. I'd sack the lot for two pins! 

Carlotta. Not you! You're much more 
likely to raise all their salaries. 

Ispenlove. Carlotta — [After gazing at her 
and turning away.~\ Listen. Our two lives are 
in our hands at this moment — this moment while 
we're talking here. 

Carlotta. I feel it. 



ACT II 63 

Ispenlove. What are we to do? What shall 
we decide to do? 

Carlotta. You see your wife and I are such 
good friends. 

Ispenlove [loudly'\. No! No! No! For 
God's sake, don't begin like that. You're above 
that sort of argument. Mary has been your 
friend. Good. You respect her; she respects 
you. Good. Is that a reason why our lives 
should be ruined, yours and mine? Will ruining 
our lives benefit Mary? I tell you everything is 
over between her and me. Everything. 

Carlotta, She hasn't the least suspicion 
about me ? 

Ispenlove. I am aware of that. \_A pause. ^ 

Carlotta. Dear love, what do you want me 
to do? 

Ispenlove. The only honest thing. I want 
you to go away with me so that Mary can get a 
divorce. 

Carlotta \_soothingly1. My poor boy! 

Ispenlove \^calmed^. We shall go away and 
leave everything. You understand ? 

Carlotta [reflectively^. Yes. Of all the things 
we possess now, we should have nothing but 
ourselves. Thousands have done what you are 
asking me to do. And all of them have thought 
that their own case was different from all the 
other cases. And a few have not regretted the 



64 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

price. A few have been happy. A few have re- 
tained the illusion. 

Ispenlove. Illusion, dear girl.? 

Carlotta. Yes. The supreme illusion of love. 
Isn't it an illusion? I have seen it at work in 
others, and in exactly the same way I see it at 
work in you and me. . . . No one can foretell 
the end of love. 

Ispenlove. Carlotta, if you keep on like that, 
you'll frighten me. 

Carlotta [^smilingl, I? No. I will brace 
you. Because whatever the end of the illusion 
and the price paid, I am one of those who believe 
that the illusion is worth it and that it's divine. 
. . . Only, don't let our love be blind. We 
should go away. But we should creep back. 
They nearly all do; and we should. And then 
would come the ordeal for our love. 

Ispenlove. Then would you prefer to stay 
here through all the divorce business and brazen 
it out.? 

Carlotta. No. 

Ispenlove, It would be frightful, 

Carlotta. It would. 

Ispenlove. Well, there's no other alternative. 

Carlotta. Yes, there is another. [Moving 
away from him.'] 

Ispenlove [with hope]. What is it? 

Carlotta [quietly hut impressively]. We can 
resist temptation. We can give each other up, 



ACT II 65 

now, this afternoon. You can return to your 
wife. We can both of us prove to our friends — 
yes, and to ourselves — that there may be some- 
thing splendid in the soul stronger than sexual 
love. Do you know what it is ? Fortitude ! 

Ispenlove [^with abandonment^, I cannot! I 
cannot ! . . . I've kissed you ! 

Carlotta \_with an appealing, protesting ges- 
ture^. You cannot? You say you love and yet 
you cannot endure? 

[Enter suddenly Miss Palmer, l., from the bou- 
doir. She stops undecided at the door.'] 

Carlotta. Come in, Mis-s Patlmer, come in. 

Miss Palmer [ shutting the door, very dis- 
turbed^. I just wanted a word with you. 

Carlotta. What is it? 

Miss Palmer. If you could spare a moment — 
now! 

Carlotta [after a momenfs hesitation]. Mr. 
Ispenlove, will you come in again later on — say 
in an hour — a couple of hours — before dinner? 

Ispenlove. But 

Carlotta [firmly]. If you wouldn't mind. 

Ispenlove [weaJdy], Certainly, Miss Peel. 

Carlotta [with a bright smile]. Au revoir, 
then. 

[Exit Ispenlove, in silence, r.] 

Carlotta [sharply.] Now, Emmeline, what on 
earth is the matter ? 



66 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Miss Palmer, Mrs. Ispenlove is here. She 
came straight to the boudoir. 

Carlotta [startled^. But Mrs. Ispenlove left 
not long since. 

Miss Palmer \_still very calmly^. She's come 
back. And she wants to see you alone. She 
wouldn't rest till I came in to see whether they'd 
all gone. I don't know what it is. 

Carlotta \_going to the door, l.] Is that you, 
Mrs. Ispenlove ? Please do come in. I'm all 
alone. 
\_Enter Mrs, Ispenlove, l. Exit Miss Palmer, l.] 

Mrs, Ispenlove. Carlotta! [^Carlotta makes 
no reply. 1 Here I am disturbing 3^ou! I hoped 
you'd be alone when I called before. I couldn't 
help trying again. No one will come in? 

Carlotta [sootliingly~\. We won't let anyone 
come in. Do sit down. Here, smell this. \_Hands 
her a Mackenzie smelling bottle. They both sit.J 

Mrs. Ispenlove. You're very kind. I need 
kindness. That's why I came. 

Carlotta. Tell me — what can I do? 

Mrs. Ispenlove. You can't do anything, my 
dear. Only I was obliged to talk to some one, 
after all the night. It's about Frank. 

Carlotta. Mr. Ispenlove! 

Mrs, Ispenlove, Yes. He's left me — yester- 
day. He hasn't been to the office. I had a sort 
of idea I might see him here, but I might have 
known he wouldn't be at any place where I 



ACT II 67 

should be likely to go. [Pause. Carlotta says 
nothing.'] I agree there's nothing to be said. 
But I do want you to understand. You can't 
understand unless I begin a long time ago. Oh, 
Carlotta ! How beautiful you are — like that 1 
You're so young! It's over twenty years since 
I fell in love. 

Carlotta. With— Frank ? 

Mrs. Ispenlove. No. With another man. 
He was a young barrister, just starting. I was 
living with my father; my mother was dead. I 
think everybody knew I had fallen in love with 
him. I'm sure he did. We saw a lot of each 
other. Some people even said it was a match, 
and that I was throwing myself away, because 
father had money. Fancy throwing myself away 
— me! Then I met Frank — Frank was younger 
than me — and Frank went mad about me, and 
he had father on his side. I wouldn't listen. I 
didn't give him a chance to say anything. This 
state of things went on for a long time. It wasn't 
my fault. It wasn't anybody's fault. 

Carlotta. Just so. 

Mrs. Ispenlove. The man I was in love with 
came nearer. He was decidedly tempted. I 
thought I was sure of him. All I wanted was to 
be his wife — whether he loved me much or little. 
Then he drew away, scarcely ever came to the 
house. And then one day I saw a paragraph in 
the Morning Post saying he was going to marry 



68 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

a woman of title, a widow and the daughter of a 
peer. He'd done it to get on. She was nearly 
twice his age. 

Carlotta. What a shame! 

Mrs, Ispenlove. Ah, my dear! I couldn't 
blame him. He didn't love me. But he nearly 
killed me. 

Carlotta. And then.? 

Mrs, Ispenlove. Frank was so persevering. 
And I couldn't help admiring Frank's character. 
What woman could? I refused him, and then I 
married him. He was as mad for me as I was 
mad for the other one. , . . But I couldn't forget 
the other one, and Frank knew all about him, 
of course. He was never mentioned between us, 
but he was always there — always, always — every 
day of the fifteen years of our marriage. We did 
our best, but it was no use. We were helpless, 
Frank and I, because you know we aren't the sort 
of people to go and make a scandal — at least, that 
was what I thought. I know differently now. 
Well, he died the day before yesterday. 

Carlotta. Who? 

Mrs, Ispenlove. The other one. Cramp- 
horne. He'd just been made a judge. He was 
the youngest judge on the Bench. 

Carlotta \_with an inflection of disdavn and 
surprise'] . Was that the man ? 

Mrs. Ispenlove l^nods]. Frank came in yes- 
terday for lunch, and after he'd glanced at the 



ACT II 69 

paper he said, "By the way, Cramphorne's dead." 
Just like that. I didn't grasp it. Frank re-« 
peated: "Cramphorne — he's dead." I burst into 
tears. I tried to stop crying, but I couldn't. I 
sobbed. Frank was furious. He said, "I know 
you've always been in love with the brute, but 
you needn't make such a damn fuss over him!" 
That made me angry. We had a scene. We 
both lost our tempers. Oh, it was terrible! One 
of the servants came in — [^ pause.'] 

Carlotta. Yes? 

Mrs. Ispenlove^ Nothingf. He's left me. 
He didn't come home last night. He said he'd 
never enter the house again, and he won't. 

Carlotta, Then you love your husband — 
now? \_Pause.'] Do you? Tell me honestly. 

Mrs. Ispenlove. Honestly? Honestly? No, 
if I loved Frank I couldn't have been so upset 
about Cramphorne. But we've been together so 
long. We're husband and wife. We got on 
pretty well considering — until lately, though he 
hasn't been so nice this last six months. I always 
tried to be a good wife to him. . . . Think of the 
scandal! A separation at my age. It's un- 
thinkable. . . . Carlotta, my married life has 
been awful — awful, for both of us. But we hid 
it. No one knew. . . . And now 

Carlotta I knew. 

Mrs. Ispenlove [startled']. How did you know? 

Carlotta. Frank told me. 



70 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Mrs. Ispenlove \_pained'\. He'd no right to do 
so. 

Carlotta. Yes, he had. \_0n an impulse.'] 
Oh, Mrs. Ispenlove, I'm terribly sorry, but 
Frank's in love with me. 

Mrs. Ispenlove. He's — IPause.] So that's 
it! IPause.] And I never guessed. \_She laughs 
and rises. Sarcastically.] Of course you advised 
him to resist temptation. 

Carlotta. I did. 

Mrs. Ispenlove. Of course! 

Carlotta, He's just been here. I sent him 
away so that I could see you. 

Mrs. Ispenlove [indignant]. And this is how 
you tell me! [Moving about,] 

Carlotta [appealingly]. How was I to tell 
you? I just had to be honest with you. Do try 
and put yourself in my place for a moment. 

Mrs, Ispenlove. In your place! [She stops 
in front of the photograph,] I suppose you'll hide 
that now — or burn it. 

Carlotta, What do you mean? 

Mrs. Ispenlove [losing control of herself ; with 
an angry gesture towards the photograph of 
Diaz.] He was your first ! Do you think I never 
guessed? I've seen it plain on your face time 
after time. Why else do you keep it there? I 
always knew you were a bad woman. Anybody 
can see what you are in every line you write. . . . 
I expect it was you who drove him to morphine. 



ACT II 71 

[iShe picks up the pJiotograph idly, and then drops 
it flat on the piano.^ 
Carlotta. Morphine? Who? 
Mrs. Ispenlove. Why! Diaz. Didn't you 
know that if he doesn't play any more nowadays 
it's because he's a hopeless morphinomaniac ? 
Don't tell me ! 

Carlotta. How do you know he's a 

Mrs. Ispenlove \_resuming control of herself). 
1 know because I saw him myself at the Grand 
Hotel when I went to Paris with Frank last 
month for the Copyright Congress. He's living 
there — unless they've turned him out. All Paris 
knew about him, and he hadn't a friend — • 
naturally. Not a friend! Good afternoon, Miss 
Peel. [Breaking down near the door.l Oh, Car- 
lotta! You'll regret this! What have I got to 
live for? [Exit r.] 

[Carlotta goes to the piano, looks at the photo- 
graph as it lies, and sets it upright again 
on the piano. Next she goes to the writing- 
desk and sits down and takes a sheet of note- 
paper. Then, after an impatient movement, 
rises and goes to door l., and opens it.'\ 
Carlotta. Emmeline, where's my pen? Bring 
it me, please. [She resumes seat at desk."] 
[Enter Miss Palmer with pen.'] 
Carlotta [taking pen]. Thanks. , That's all. 
[Exit Miss Palmer, at hack, Carlotta, after hesi- 
tations, writes. Enter Ispenlove.] 



7S SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Ispenlove [disturbing Carlotta']. You are free 
now? . . . Miss Palmer told me I might come in. 

Carlotta [starting up~\. Is this your idea of 
an hour — two hours ? 

Ispenlove [excited']. Carlotta, I came back to 
tell you — we ought to leave London to-night. 
We must leave to-night. More delay would kill 
me. Never mind packing. Let's catch the 8.40 
train at Victoria. I shall have no rest till we're 
on our way. 

Carlotta [as if dazed]. Train? What train? 

Ispenlove. For Paris, of course. I can easily 
arrange my business from there. 

Carlotta [with emotion^. Paris! 

Ispenlove. After Paris — anywhere you like. 

Carlotta, I was just writing to you. 

Ispenlove. Writing? But why? 

Carlotta [handing him the notepaper]. I didn't 
intend to see you again. . . . Read what I've 
written. 
[Ispenlove reads. A pause. Carlotta sits down.] 

Ispenlove [dropping the paper on a chair.] 
But this is a repetition of what you said to me 
when I went out just now. 

Carlotta, Yes. 

Ispenlove. Then you were serious — about 
me going back to my wife, and — and about 
showing fortitude and all that sort of thing? 
You really meant it? 

Carlotta. I did. 



ACT II 73 

Ispenlove [in despair]. You don't love me — 
never did! You were only sorry for me — when 
you let me kiss you. If you'd been in love you'd 
never have talked about love being an illusion. 
You simply couldn't. I might have known. I 
did know — all the time. You don't love me. 

Carlotta, Frank, I'm awfully fond of you. 
I am, really. . . . It's terrible to me to see you 
like this. But 

Ispenlove. I don't care whether you love me 
or whether you don't love me. I'll be satisfied 
with pity if I can't get anything else. Have pity 
on me! ... No! You won't. You won't. 
You'll never change your mind. I know you. 

Carlotta. I can't go with you. It wouldn't 
be right. It would be worse than anything. 

Ispenlove. You're thinking of your reputa- 
tion. 

Carlotta [with an outburst]. My reputation? 
Me.'' [Calming herself.] And supposing I am.'' 

Ispenlove. Well, this is the end for me. 

Carlotta. No, no ! 

Ispenlove. Do you know what I decided 
when I first came here this afternoon ? I decided 
that if you refused me, if you even judged me, I 
should go to the office and shoot myself. 

Carlotta. But you won't. 

Ispenlove. I shall. There's nothing else for 
it. 



74< SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta. You ought not to talk like that. 
It's not fair, and it won't do any good. 

Ispenlove. I know it's not fair, and I know 
it won't do any good. . . . But that's the point 
I've got to. 

[/n silence he moves towards the door. Enter 
Miss Palmer quicTdy, l.] 

Miss Palmer [calmly']. Oh, Mr. Ispenlove! 
Please come! It's a policeman. Mrs. Ispen- 
love's been under a motor-bus. She ran right in 
front of it, the policeman says. She must have 
lost her head. The 'bus knocked her down, but 
the wheels didn't touch her, and she's not hurt. 
They've got her at the chemist's round the corner. 
Our hall-porter saw the crowd and went along, 
and he knew Mrs. Ispenlove had just been here. 
Please do come at once. [Ispenlove makes no 
reply.] 

Carlotta, Run and tell the policeman Mr. 
Ispenlove will come instantly. Run ! 

[Exit Miss Palmer, r. A pause,] 

Ispenlove [quichly]. Then it was my wife who 
persuaded you to throw me over? 

Carlotta, Frank, you must have pity — on 
both of us. Go and take her home. She's tried 
to kill herself — and failed. [Ispenlove starts,] 
You were in love with her when I was a girl at 
school. She was everything to you once, and she 
is still alive. Good-bye. 

Ispenlove [at the door, bitterly]. You let me 



ACT II 75 

kiss you — and then you thought of your precious 
reputation. 

[Carlotta drops her head. Exit Ispenlove, r. 
Carlotta takes up the photograph again and 
kisses it. Enter Miss Palmer, r.] 

Miss Palmer. Oh, Miss Peel! What a mercy 
she wasn't hurt ! 

Carlotta. You're sure she isn't? 

Miss Palmer. The hall-porter says she was 
sitting on a chair in the chemist's shop and cry- 
ing. The reaction, I suppose. 

Carlotta. I have to go to Paris to-night. 

Miss Palmer. To-night.'* 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Miss Palmer. Alone? 

Carlotta. Yes. 

CUETAIN. 



ACT III 

The salon of a furnished flat in a dubious street 
of Paris. Doors back and r. The former 
almost wide open, showing a little entrance- 
hall with the front door of the flat. The 
door R. leads to a bedroom. The window is 
not seen. The furniture is pretentious and 
ugly, and shows signs of wear. A table in the 
middle. A man's hat hangs behind the im/ner 
door. The scene must be set shallow. 

Time : Early afternoon. 
Two days have elapsed. 

[Diaz is alone, wandering about the room. There 
is a ring at the front door. He goes into the 
ante-chamber, opens the front door cau- 
tiously, and lets in Carlotta. He then shuts 
the front door with a mysterious and deter- 
mined air. He motions Carlotta to enter the 
room. She obeys, apprehensive. He follows 
her, and shuts the inner door.l 

Carlotta [with ingratiating softness of tone, 
looking around^. Then it is you! [She holds 
out her hand.'\ 

Diaz [inimicallyl . Oh ! So you're English, are 

you? 

77 



78 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta \_overpowered'\. Don't you remember 
me? 

Diaz, Who the devil are you? 

Carlotta. I'm Magdalen. 

Diaz. Magdalen 1 Magdalen! \_Laug'hs.~} 
Which one, I wonder. 

Carlotta [weakly, after a pause']. Don't you 
remember that night after the concert ? 

Diaz. After the concert ! After the concert ! 
You might think I'd given only one concert in 
my life. What do you want here? What did 
you come for? 

Carlotta. I came — to see you. 

Diaz. Well, you see me. What else ? 

Carlotta. I thought you'd like to meet me 
again. I thought you were lonely and I might — 
help you — somehow. 

Diaz. Oh, that's it, is it? Well, sit down. 
[She sits. Diaz remains standing.'] I'm just in 
the mood to talk to people like you. How did 
you get my address ? 

Carlotta. 1 

Diaz. Now answer me. How did you get my 
address ? Did you get it from the Grand Hotel ? 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Diaz. — And I suppose they told you they'd 
turned me out? 

Carlotta. They said 

Diaz. Did they tell you they'd turned me out 
didn't they? 



ACT III 79 

Carlotta. They said they'd suggested that 
you might prefer a private lodging. 

Diaz, It's a lie. They didn't suggest any 
such thing. On the contrary, when I informed 
them I wouldn't stand their awful hotel a day 
longer, they begged me to stay on. Of course it's 
simply a fortune to any hotel to have Emilio Diaz 
among its guests. I left because I chose to leave. 
Now you may think that this isn't much of a 
place. You may think, for example, that this 
room isn't furnished in the best taste. But I like 
it, and what's it got to do with you, after all.'' 
When I want your opinions I'll ask for them. 
This place was offered to me by a kind friend. 
You'd probably sniiF at her. But she never asks 
me for money and she's the one friend that 
remains. She hasn't anything to do with the 
persecution. ... At least I think she hasn't. I 
can't be absolutely sure. 

Carlotta. Persecution? What do you mean? 

Diaz. Good! Good! That's pretty fair act- 
ing. So you'll make out you didn't know I was 
being persecuted.'' 

Carlotta. I certainly hadn't the slightest idea. 

Diaz \^sneeringly'\. Naturally you hadn't! 
Therefore I'll give you a few interesting details. 
You're no doubt aware that I'm what's called a 
morphinomaniac. . . . Speak up ! Speak up ! 
, , . Never heard the word morphine mentioned 
in connection with me ? Yes or no ? 



80 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta, Yes. 

Diaz. Ah! I knew I should drag it out of 
you! [With violent and positive sincerity. ~\ 
Well, it's a disgraceful slander! A disgraceful 
slander ! I was very ill a long time ago, and after 
my illness I did take a little morphine, strictly 
under doctor's orders. But I've taken none for 
years. None! Do you understand me? Not a 
solitary injection! I've been suffering from neu- 
rasthenia — pure nervous debility. And how was 
that brought on. \Quietly.'] It was brought on 
partly of course by overwork. The whole world 
knows how I have worked. [Loudly.^ But it 
was brought on much more by this persecution, 
this damnable plot against me. 

Carlotta, But who — ? 

Diaz [^stopping her; mysteriously']. Ah! . . . 
Ah! ... I know him! I've traced him! Prac- 
tically, my evidence is complete. Anyhow, it will 
be, to-morrow — or next week at latest. I have 
him. . . . You guess his motive. Who wouldn't.? 
Professional jealousy, of course! He was afraid. 
His audiences were lessening, lessening. He was 
never a first-class pianist, but he was a first-class 
scoundrel — that I'll admit. He got hold of the 
fact that I used to take a little morphine. And 
on that he built everything. First he bribed the 
critics. There was a most remarkable change in 
my notices. Then audiences began to fall away. 
Then it was the concert agents who turned 



ACT III 81 

against me. Every one of 'em. Then I couldn't 
even hire a hall. Think of it! Couldn't even 
hire a hall! Me! Then he actually got me 
thrown out of the Grand Hotel. That was the 
climax. . . . But my neurasthenia is rapidly 
disappearing. I'm much better. I'm much 
stronger. Do I look neurasthenic? 

Carlotta. No ! You look quite strong. 

Diaz. Don't I look like a master? 

Carlotta. Yes. 

Diaz [imperiously^. Master of what? Master 
of what ? Say it ! 

Carlotta. Master of the piano. 

Diaz. Ah! . . . And yet you're only acting, 
miss. I can see through you. You — and your 
employer. You imagine you're very clever, very 
subtle. But I've twigged the game. He knows 
I'm getting better of my neurasthenia. And he's 
afraid, he's trembling once more. There's a new 
plot brewing, and he's sent you here to spy out 
the land. I was sure of it the moment you came 
into the room. 

Carlotta [rising~\. Please, please don't think 
such a thing. 

Diaz. Sit down! Sit down, I tell you! [She 
sits. Calmly.'] Why, you silly woman, can't 
you see I've been playing with you? You're not 
really causing* me the faintest anxiety. Do 
you suppose I should have confided to you all 
these secrets if I hadn't made up my mind in 



82 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

advance to kill you? [^With excitement.'] You 
little thought 

Carlotta. Kill me? 

Viaz {^talcing a revolver from the drawer]. Cer- 
tainly. What else is there for me to do? . . . 
No, sit down. Don't move. 

Carlotta. I shan't move. But please re- 
flect 

Diaz [gloatingly]. You're frightened. 

Carlotta. I'm not. But I've been the cause 
of a great deal of unhappiness, and I don't want 
to be the cause of any more. 

Diaz. You won't be. 

Carlotta. I shall if you shoot me. Just think 
what it will mean for you — please! 

Diaz. Clever! Clever! But it won't help 
you, Magdalen! . . . [As if recollecting.] Mag- 
dalen? Magdalen? The mail-train. 

Carlotta [rising suddenly]. Emilio! 
[Diaz shoots and misses her. The bullet breaks 
an ornament behind.] 

Diaz [rushing away], I didn't mean to shoot! 
I didn't mean to shoot! [Exit, r.] 

[Carlotta looks round at what is smashed. Her 
emotion is obvious , and she does not know 
what to do next. Enter Rosalie, back, sud- 
denly, in a state of excitement.] 

Rosalie. Mais qu*est ce qu'il y a done? Qu^est 
ce qu'il y a . . . madame? 

Carlotta. Er — nothing, I think. 



ACT ni 83 

Rosalie \^c aimer']. Ah! Madame is English. 

Carlotta. Yes, madame. 

Rosalie, I imagined to myself I did hear a 
revolver. 

Carlotta. Yes, madame. It went off by 
accident. You see what it broke. Monsieur 
Diaz — You know Monsieur Diaz, madame.? 

Rosalie. Do I know him, madame? We are 
good friends — we are the best friends, since a 
long time. In my flat, Monsieur Diaz is at 
home. And I am at home in his. What would 
you? 

Carlotta \_cautiously'\. Monsieur Diaz has just 
gone into the next room, madame. 

Rosalie. Ah! When he returns he will be 
better. 

Carlotta. What do you mean, madame? 

Rosalie. Madame is without doubt an ac- 
quaintance of Monsieur's? 

Carlotta. Yes, I am. But I hadn't seen him 
for many years. 

Rosalie. Without indiscretion, madame, one 
may speak freely? 

Carlotta. Certainly, madame. 

Rosalie. Madame, you have been seriously 
agitated. That sees itself. I suppose, therefore, 
that you were some little surprised by the 
condition of Monsieur Diaz. You had the mis- 
fortune to arrive at the hour of one of his 
paroxysms. 



84. SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta, Paroxysms? What 



Rosalie, You have not heard madame? 
He — il se pique. He gives himself injections. 
He is giving himself an injection now — at this 
moment. He is morphinomane, 

Carlotta, But he assured me — — 

Rosalie, Naturally! They all do that. It 
is I who tell it to you. And God knows if I have 
not met a few of them in my life! It is a pity, 
eh.? But what would you.? We all have some- 
thing. I, for example, I am not morphinomane, 
I have a health of iron. Never a pain. I drink, 
so to speak, nothing. I have money. I am still 
young. But I am mad. I recognise it. I am 
mad. Well, Monsieur Diaz — he pricks himself 
with morphine. It is an amiable vice, except 
on the bad days. Never have I encountered 
a man with so much charm, so much heart, and 
so distinguished! True, the morphine will kill 
him. But we shall all die. What would you.? 

Carlotta [warmly^. But he can be cured! 

Rosalie [with tranquillity^. No, madame. Be- 
hold a little malady that cures itself never. 

Carlotta [still more warmly^. But he must be 
cured ! 

Rosalie [nonchalantly, 1^ As you please, 
madame. . . . Shall I go and see — [With a 
gesture towards the door, r.] 

Carlotta. Just a moment, madame. 

Rosalie. With pleasure, madame. 



ACT ni 85 

Carlotta, He lives here quite alone? 

Rosalie, Quite alone. 

Carlotta. But he has a servant? 

Rosalie, Madame, he shares my charwoman. 
She comes here from ten to twelve. Then to my 
flat from twelve to three. You see that in my 
vocation it is impossible to rise early. I hide 
nothing from you, madame. Besides everybody 
knows it. It is I who found this furnished flat 
for Monsieur Diaz. My flat is on the same floor. 
It is all that is most convenient, 

Carlotta. But his meals I 

Rosalie. His meals? Let us see. His petit 
dejeuner, he takes it in bed — ^when he takes it. 
For the rest, he goes to a cafe-restaurant. Or 
sometimes he takes lunch in my flat with Madame 
Leonie and me. Leonie is my very dear friend, 
whom I love much. She has a room in my flat. 
When Monsieur Diaz comes, we are quite gay, we 
three, but in an intimate fashion. I have a 
beautiful pianola, with the best rolls — everything 
that is latest in waltzes. I adore the waltz, 
above all, the new varieties — Ah! English 
musical comedy! I am mad about it. There is 
nothing to compare with it. I always play the 
pianola for Diaz. 

Carlotta. But you knew that Monsieur Diaz 
was a very celebrated pianist! 

Rosalie [nonchalantly']. Truly? I had per- 
haps heard something about it. Indeed, it seems 



86 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

to me that I remember, when I was young, I 
remember to see his name once on a street 
advertisement of a classical concert. But, you 
know, the classical concert — that is not my kind. 
My business is at the music-hall. Marigny 
Theatre in summer. Folies-Bergere in winter. I 
have no time for amusements. 

Carlotta. But your friends — did they never 
tell you, madame? 

Rosalie. Madame, I have many friends, be- 
cause I am a good girl and everybody knows it. 
But I have never said the name of Diaz to my 
friends. 

Carlotta. Why not, madame.? 

Rosalie \_wit7i a slight trace of resentment^. He 
asked me never to say his name. And one can 
count on me. 

Carlotta. And nobody comes to see him.? 

Rosalie. Madame, you are the first. You 
see, this street — shall we say? — repels. 

Carlotta. But how can you tell, madame, thal^ 
I am the first? \^She begins to take off her gloves. '\ 

Rosalie [with more resentment. 1^ I am at home 
all day, madame. 

Carlotta. But at night? 

Rosalie [impatiently'l. Ah! At night, natu- 
rally I am not at home. I go to my regular 
music-hall. It is my existence. I am not like 
the others. I am a serious girl. Is not my 
English very good? Do not my friends make 



"ACT ni 87 

me compliments every night on my English? 
As I say, I cannot answer for the evenings of 
Monsieur Diaz. If you insist — \_With a sudden 
change to extreme benevolence as Carlotta uncov- 
ers her left hand. 1 Ah! madame — mademoiselle. 
I ask pardon. I perceive that mademoiselle has 
no ring. How content I am ! 

Carlotta. But why? 

Rosalie. Ah, mademoiselle ! In our profession 
it is the married women whom we have the best 
reason to fear. . . . How content I am ! mademoi- 
selle, you will pardon to me my mistake. I am 
perhaps too frank. I speak too much. That is 
my defect. 

Carlotta. You have been most kind, madame. 
It is I who have been indiscreet. Will you tell 
me one more thing? Monsieur Diaz never leaves 
here ? 

Rosalie. He has not — up to now. Why 
should he? One is very well here. There is a 
balcony. True, in the great heats Paris is 
enervating. But Monsieur Diaz has not yet 
experienced the great heats. For myself, I never 
leave Paris. 

Carlotta. Really ! 

Rosalie. Except to see my little boy — and that 
is only in the suburbs. 

Carlotta. So you have a little boy? 

Rosalie. Yes, he lives with my parents at 
Meudon. He is four years old. 



88 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta. You are very fond of him? 

Rosalie. Fond ! I adore him ! And he loves 
me too. If he is naughty, one has only to tell 
him that he will make his leetle mummy ill, and 
he will be good at once. When one tells him to 
obey his grandfather because his grandfather 
provides him with food, he says bravely: "No, 
not grandfather; it is leetle mummy." Is it not 
strange he should know that I pay for him? 

Carlotta. How nice! And you see him 
often? 

Rosalie. No. Only once a month. I take him 
for a promenade. I run with him till we reach 
the woods, where I can have him to myself, alone. 
I avoid people. Nobody except my parents know 
that he is my child. One supposes that he is a 
nurse-child, received by my parents. But all the 
world will know now. Sunday last I went to Meu- 
don with Leonie. Leonie wished to buy him some 
sweets at the grocer's. In the shop I asked him if 
he would like peppermints. "Yes," he answered. 
"Yes, who, young man?" the grocer corrected him. 
"Yes, leetle mummy," he replied loudly and 
bravely. The grocer understood. We all low- 
ered our heads. . . . You, naturally, have no 
child, mademoiselle? 

Carlotta. — No. How I envy you? 

Rosalie. You must not. I have been so un- 
happy that I can never be as unhappy again. 
Nothing matters now. All I wish is to save 



ACT ni 89 

enough money to be able to live quietly in a 
little house in the country. 

Carlotta. With your child. 

Rosalie. My child will grow up and leave me. 
He will become a man and forget his leetle 
mummy. 

Carlotta. Don't talk like that. 

Rosalie [roughly~\. Why not? Is it not true, 
then? Do you believe there is a difference 
between one man and another? They are all 
alike— aU, all, aU! 

Carlotta. But surely you have some tender 
souvenir of your child's father. 

Rosalie. Do I know who is my child's 
father? . . . [^Controlling herself and smiling 
lightly. '\ But there! What would you. While 
hating all these gentlemen, we love them. They 
are beasts ! Beasts ! But we cannot do without 
them. What would you? [In a low voice, 

moving towards door, e.] Now I will see 

[Enter Leonie, hach.'\ 

Leonie [at the door, in a confidential whisper, to 
Rosalie^. Monsieur Chirac. 

Rosalie, Monsieur Chirac. Je m'en fiche. 
Tell him to go. 

Leonie. It is the nephew, not the uncle. 

Rosalie. Ah! In that case, I come at once. 
Mademoiselle! [She hows. 1^ 

[Exeunt Rosalie and Leonie, hac1c.'\ 



90 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

[Carlotta moves about, examining the room.'\ 
[Enter Diaz, r.] 

Diaz [now quite calm and master of himself, 
hut nervous^. You are not gone, then? 

Carlotta [cheerfully and naturally^. I was 
just wondering how long you'd leave me by 
myself. 

Diaz [very gloomily']. What are you going to 
say to me? 

Carlotta. What about? 

Diaz [picking up part of the broken article], I 
nearly killed you. 

Carlotta. Oh, you were really very wide 
indeed. Of course revolvers are dangerous. The 
man who invented them was extremely ill- 
advised. But there they are, and sometimes, I 
suppose, they will insist on going off by accident. 

Diaz. Accident ? But I said I should kill you. 

Carlotta. Did you? You never meant it. 

Diaz [with emotion]. I assure you I didn't. 

Carlotta. I want no assurance. 

Diaz, When I suddenly began to remember 
who you were — it came over me all at once — I 
didn't know what I was doing. I couldn't even 
feel the revolver in my hand. 

Carlotta. What was it made you remember 
me in the end? [She sits.] 

Diaz, Ah! Perhaps it was your carelessness 
about yourself. 

Carlotta. Carelessness about myself? 



ACT III 91 

Diaz, You didn't seem to mind at all what 
the consequences would be to you if I shot you. 
You were only concerned about the unpleasant 
results to me. 

Carlotta, Don't let's talk any more about 
that accident. It's over. 

Diaz. Why did you come to see me? 

Carlotta. I've told you. I knew 3^ou were — 
lonely. And I thought perhaps I might be able 
to help you. I started off the very day I heard. 
You see, I was quite free. I'd no ties — no ties 
whatever. So I just came at once — and found 
you. 

Diaz. It's too late. 

Carlotta. It's not too late until one of us is 
dead. 

Diaz. Ah, Magdalen, what made you run 
away like that — in the night ? No trace ! Noth- 
ing! It was terrible for me. I was in love 
with you. I couldn't believe you'd vanished 
altogether. For months afterwards I expected to 
hear from you. But not a word. And what 
could I do? I didn't know where you lived, or 
even your name. I didn't know anything about 
you except that you were wonderful, unique. 
Then at last I gave up. . . . 

Carlotta. Forgive me. I alone was the 
sinner. I had too much pride and not enough 
faith. I was afraid of my miracle. I was a 
coward. I did well to call myself Magdalen ! 



92 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Diaz, Then that's not your name? I always 
knew it wasn't. Why did you call yourself 
Magdalen? \_Carlotta shakes her head to signify 
that she doesnH hnow.'] What am I to call you? 

Carlotta. My name is Carlotta Peel. 

Diaz \_startled1. What! Are you — [aS'^o^s.]. 

Carlotta. Oh, no! ... At least not for you. 
Only for the public. Please don't speak of my 
books. For you I will be the woman and 
nothing else. I've come back — [with meaningly 
exactly as I left you. Forgive me. I know that 
everything might have been different if I'd had 
faith. But forgive me. 

Diaz [^springing forward, and dropping on one 
knee at her feet^. I? Forgive you? Do not 
destroy me with your generosity. [Bares his arm 
and shows it to her.^ Look! Look! 

Carlotta [gazing at the arm^. Have you hurt 
yourself ? 

Diaz. Yes, I've hurt myself. Those are the 
marks of the morphine needle. . . .Wounds. . . . 
Scores, hundreds of them! That's the latest. 
[Pointing.^ I was simply telling you a lie when 
I said I never took morphine. See this room. 
This is where I live. This is what I've come to ! 
I've not touched a piano for months. I have no 
piano. Think how I received you, how I raved — 
yet I believed every word while I was saying it. 
I needn't explain. You understand. Look at 
my clothes ! Look at my face ! Look at my 
eyes! I've never confessed to anybody before. 



ACT ni 93 

But I confess to you. I must. I wouldn't 
deceive jou. I'm the result of morphine! 

Carlotta [with an assisting gesture, persuading 
him to rise^. It was not your fault. 

Diaz. What do you mean — it wasn't my 
fault.? [Hesits.l 

Carlotta. You first took it under the advice 
of a doctor, after you'd been very ill. 

Diaz. Do you remember me telling you — that 
night.? Yes, that's true enough. And you know, 
it's a wonderful thing, morphine is. The effect 
of it is almost instantaneous. A single prick, 
that's all. One moment you're on the rack and 
in the most appalling torture, and the next 
moment you're off the rack and you haven't a 
pain left, and you feel equal to anything. It's an 
absolutely marvellous thing. 

Carlotta. Only it has other consequences. 

Diaz [reflective^. Yes. 

Carlotta [intimately^. D'you know — it's very 
nice of you to talk to me as you are doing. I like 
it awfully. [Casually. '\ Now what I don't un- 
derstand is, why you keep on taking the stuff. I 
suppose you could give it up if you wanted to? 

Diaz [with assurance']. Of course I could. I 
could give it up to-morrow — any time. 

Carlotta. Then why don't you? 

Diaz [judicially'] . To tell you the truth, for me 
to give it up would be a mistake. It's necessary 
to my health, and when I say health I include 
mental health. I have given it up more than 



94 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

once. But I have been obliged to take to it 
again. When you came to-day, I had abstained 
for a lonff time. Think of the state I was in! 
Anything might have happened if I had not had 
the presence of mind to go instantly and give 
myself an injection. You must admit there was 
no alternative. 

Carlotta. I won't admit it, 

Diaz, That's because you're a woman. 

Carlotta [_^rmZ?/]. Yes, it is because I'm a 
woman. You live alone. You've always lived 
alone. It has been morphine or nothing. But I 
am here now, and I am the alternative. I will 
be your morphine. [^Softly.'] What do you say? 

Diaz \_after a pause, breaking do'wn~\. Don't! 
Don't! I'm telling you a lie when I say I can 
give it up. It's only boasting. I've got Crother's 
book on morphine. I know it by heart. I know 
the last delusion of the morphine-taker is that he 
can give it up whenever he chooses. I can't give 
it up. I've failed over and over again. I'm the 
victim. I'm hopeless. Thank heaven I still 
have money, and I can finish my life in comfort. 

Carlotta. Then if you won't let me take the 
place of your morphine, morphine and I will share 
you between us. 

Diaz, What do you mean.? 

Carlotta. Just that. \_Stands.'\ Will you 
turn me out.? 

Diaz. You don't realise 

Carlotta. Realise? I perfectly realise. I 



ACT III 95 

realise I left you because I was a coward. I 
realise I've come back. I realise that once you 
were one of the finest artists in the world, and 
that every pleasure and every delight was yours 
for the asking, and that there was no power 
greater than your power. \^With restrained scorn.^ 
And I realise that now you're a victim; you're 
broken; you're helpless; you've no future. In- 
stead of exerting power, you're a slave, and your 
master is a drug, a miserable drop of something 
or other in a glass tube. I realise that you'll get 
worse and worse, and that in time you'll become 
almost obscene. I realise that I shall have to 
watch all this, and that you'll deceive me with 
odious little fibs and thumping lies, and make me 
frightfully unhappy, and ill-treat me, and rave at 
me, and make horrid accusations against me, and 
I realise that in the end you'll die and I shall 
bury 3^ou, and all the newspapers will remember 
you, rather contemptuously, for just one day, 
and then forget yon forever. That's what I 
realise. Is it enough .^^ 

Diaz. Why do you scorn me.? 

Carlotta. I don't scorn you. You scorn 
yourself. I'm only showing you how well I 
realise what that self-scorn will lead to. 

Diaz. You're an angel, but you're a devil too. 

Carlotta. I'm neither an angel nor a devil. 
I'm the girl you took and transformed into a 
woman. You said you loved her. 

Diaz Instill seated^. Magdalen, go away. It's 



96 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

no use. I could never face the public again. 

Carlotta. And why not? 

Diaz, People would laugh. 

Carlotta. Nobody would laugh. The public 
is the faithfuUest thing on earth. You were 
born a great artist and you'll always be one. 
You'll die a great artist if you die in a ditch. The 
rest is nothing but practice. You'll say you're 
out of practice. Well, you would get into 
practice, that's all. You'd make your reappear- 
ance after a long illness, and your reappearance 
would be the most distinguished musical event 
that ever happened. People would stand out in 
the street all night to be sure of hearing you. 
When you came on to the platform the applause 
would be tremendous. It would unnerve you. 
But you'd get over that, and in half an hour 
you'd be — Diaz again ! 

Diaz. Ah! But the months and months and 
months it would take. And in the meantime I 
should have to live. Magdalen, I've not come to 
the end of my lying. I said I had money. I 
haven't. It's all gone. I've come to the end of 
my resources. 

Carlotta. You aren't at the end of mine. 

Diaz. I couldn't live on a woman. 

Carlotta [angrily^. If you expect me to 
answer that sort of silly sentimentalism you're 
mistaken. Why couldn't you live on a woman .f^ 
[^More gently. 1^ Surely when it's a question of a 
career 



ACT III 97 

Diaz. And your career. What would happen 
to that? 

Carlotta, You are my career. 

Diaz [in a new tone'\. Magdalen, be honest 
with me. Do j^ou really believe I could be 
cured? Really? [Stops her as she begins to 
speak.'\ Now be careful. Look me in the face. 
Do you really believe I could be cured? 

Carlotta. I do. It's my religion. I know 
you can be cured. You talk about Crother's 
book. I've read Crother's book, too. I once 
wrote a short story about morphine. The idea 
came into my head the very night you and I met, 
but I didn't use it for years. Of course you can 
be cured. Crother definitely states it. Hun- 
dreds have been cured. You are going to be 
cured. . . . You are going to cure yourself. 

Diaz [with resolution, rising'\. I will. [Car- 
lotta holds out her hand, which he takes.^ But 
you aren't going to leave me? 

Carlotta [quietly']. Don't I belong to you? 
And don't you belong to me? You took me, but 
I also took you. You're mine. Come with me. 

Diaz. Come ? Where ? 

Carlotta. Come away. Away from here. 
[Picking up her gloves. l^ 

Diaz. Now? I can't come now. 

Carlotta [persuasively and naturallyl. Why 
not? There's your hat. You don't want any- 
thing else. We'll buy everything. We're going 
to begin again. 



98 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Diaz, But I've got a few belongings here. 

Carlotta. Have you got the key of the flat in 
your pocket? 

Diaz \_as if hypnotisedl. Yes. 

Carlotta. Then we'll send for the belongings. 
[Syren-like.^ Come with me. [She takes his hat, 
which is hanging behind the inner door, gives it to 
Mm, opens the door and holds it open for him.l 

Diaz [moving back a little^. I must say good- 
bye to some friends on this floor. It won't take 
a moment. 

Carlotta, No, no I [Pause, Then gently.'] 
We haven't that moment to spare, Emilio. And 
you're mine. [Diaz approaches her,] Aren't you 
going to kiss me before we leave? 

Diaz [seizing her arms], I dared not. 

Carlotta, Then who will dare if the master 
will not dare ? 

Diaz. Here, in this horrible room? 

Carlotta, Where else? Here I found you. 
[He kisses her. She returns his kiss with passion.] 

Carlotta [in Diazes arms]. Good-bye, room. 
We shall never see you again. [Looking at Diaz,] 
Oh, I feel so weak! 

Diaz, You've given your strength to me. 
[Carlotta releases and stiffens herself, and with a 
firm gesture opens the outer door. At a sign 
from her Diaz goes out. She follows, and 
shuts the door behind her,] 

CURTAIN. 



ACT IV 

Same scene as Act II, 

There is a small trayy with a glass and a decanter 
of wine on the piano. 

Time : Between eight and nine at night. 
Fourteen months have elapsed, 

[Carlottay in evening dress, with cloak, is putting 
on her gloves. Enter Miss Palmer, l, with a 
telegram.} 

Carlotta [nervous, controlling herself}. Open 
it, Emmeline. 

Miss Palmer, Reply paid. [Reading.} "Await- 
ing answer as to proposed contract for new book. 
Urgent. Snyder." 

Carlotta. Why doesn't he telephone, I won- 
der? 

Miss Palmer. You know they haven't con- 
nected us up again yet. 

Carlotta. Of course not. I was forgetting. 

Miss Palmer, What am I to say.^ 

Carlotta. Oh ! Say "Regret cannot make any 
contract at present. Writing." 

Miss Palmer [patiently, protesting}. Really? 
99 



100 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

You know you've never had such terms offered 
before. And Mr. Snyder must think it's very 
important, or he wouldn't have telegraphed so 
late. I expect he wants to catch the American 
mail to-morrow morning. He'll be disappointed. 

Carlotta. Well, he must bravely force back 
his tears, that's all. 

Miss Palmer, But ' 

Carlotta. Emmeline, how tiresome you are! 
For over a year I haven't had one single ghost of 
an idea for a novel. You seem to think I ought 
to be a machine for providing Mr. Snyder with 
ten per cent. 

[Enter Diaz, r., in evening dress."\ 

Miss Palmer, Very good. [She writes on the 
telegraph form at the piano. While writing, '\ Mr. 
Diaz, the wine is there. 

Diaz, No thanks. [With determined gaiety,'] 
And who is Mr. Snyder? 

Carlotta, He's my agent. 

Diaz, Agent ? 

Carlotta, He looks after all my book con- 
tracts for me. 

Diaz [nonchalantlyl. Oh, I thought only music 
hall artistes and people like me had to employ 
agents. 

[Enter Snape, u., in evening dress, with overcoat; 
hat in hand.] 

Snape [with suppressed excitement]. The car's 
waiting. 



ACT IV 101 

Diaz \_calmly'\. Let it wait. 

Snape [looking at his watcJi]. Eight ten. Con- 
cert begun. 

Diaz. Snape, are you getting nervous in your 
old age? I should have thought the sight of 
those young virgins waiting outside the upper 
circle entrance at three o'clock this afternoon 
ought to have set you up for the rest of the day. 
\_Laug1iing easily.^ Such a thing's never been 
known at a Philharmonic concert before, I 
imagine. 

[Miss Palmer rings the hellS\ 

Snape [complying with Diaz's mood']. Yes, 
there will be no spots on the audience. I've just 
been up there. Not room for another soul. 

[Diaz. I hope they'll find a corner for me. 
[Snape laughs obsequiously.'] 

Carlotta [tactfully.] Perhaps we had better 
be going. 

Diaz [still lightly]. Now please do let it be 
generally understood — there's no chance of me 
being wanted before 8.45, and I have a most 
particujjar objection to waiting about in the 
artistes' room. [Enter Parlourmaid, r. Diaz 
continues, as if addressing the company, including 
the hypnotised parlourmaid.] I don't quite know 
what's the matter with everybody. I'm making 
my reappearance at a Philharmonic concert, than 
which nothing, even in heaven, could be more 
respectable. I'm playing Beethoven's Emperor 



102 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Concerto, because that is the latest piece of 
pianoforte music that the Philharmonic Society 
has ever really cared for. All the musical 
mummies in London, including the arch-mummies 
Sir Emil and Lady Steinberg, have crawled out 
of their coffins to hear me, and my intention is to 
put the fear of God into them. It won't be very 
difficult, and nobody need worry the least bit in 
the world. [^To the parlourmaid, comically.'] 
And you.? 

Parlourmaid, The bell rang, sir. 

Miss Palmer \^who, during the foregoing speech 
has copied the telegram into her notebook.] Please 
give this to the telegraph boy. 

[Exit Parlourmaid.] 

Diaz [to Snape.] By the way, did you write 
to the Mercury and refuse that interview.? 

Snape [taken aback and recovering]. I will 
do it. 

Miss Palmer. Can I do it for you, Mr. 
Diaz.? 

Snape [jealous]. I'll see to it. I've not for- 
gotten it. 

Diaz [teasingly]. Look here, Snape, you'd 
better go down and cool your heated brow in the 
car. [Exit Snape, r. Diaz continues, to Car- 
lotta.] It's a lucky thing for the esteemed Snape 
that I've put him on his legs again. He's aged. 
He's not the imperturbable paragon he used to be. 

Carlotta [tearing a glove; with a nervous 



ACT IV 103 

movement.'] Oh, dear! Miss Palmer, do run and 
get me another pair. You know where they are, 
don't you? 

[Exit Miss Palmer, l., swiftly hut calmly.'] 

Diaz [looking at his photograph on the piano], 
DarHng — a boon! 

Carlotta. Yes? 

Diaz [with great persuasiveness]. Do you spec- 
ially want that photograph there? [Pause. He 
goes on, feigning a childlike pout.] I do so dislike 
seeing my own portrait about. 

Carlotta, It's been just where it is ever since 
I took this flat. [A silence.] I'll have it moved. 
[He kisses her.] I'm sorry to keep you waiting. 
[She drags off a glove.] 

Diaz. But you aren't. D'you know, I almost 
wish you weren't coming. 

Carlotta [struck.] Why? 

Diaz. I'm not nervous, but you might make 
me nervous. 

Carlotta. Me! I — ^I thought you needed me. 
Don't you remember 

Diaz. I was very much all right at the 
rehearsal this morning, and rehearsals are apt to 
be ticklish things. . . . You see, I oughtn't to 
count always on you. I've got to be inde- 
pendent. 

Carlotta. But to-night — / [A silence.] Yes 
I quite see. I won't go. I hadn't thought of it 



104 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

like that. \^A silence.'] You'll come back to me 
instantly you've played? 

Diaz, Two minutes in tLe car. [LooMng at 
the cloch.] In an hour — less than an hour — I 
shall be here again. [Fields up his hat and over- 
coat.'] Well — I'll go down and put Snape out of 
his misery. 

Carlotta [embracing him fondly; in a whisper], 
I can't stop my heart from going with you. 
[Exit Diaz, r. Carlotta removes her cloak and 
sits down. Enter Miss Palmer, with gloves,] 

Miss Palmer, Here they are. 

Carlotta, So sorry! I shan't want them 
now. I'm not going. 

Miss Palmer [calmly surprised]. Not to the 
concert ? 

Carlotta, No. I don't feel equal to it. 

Miss Palmer, Mr. Diaz has gone ? 

Carlotta, Yes. 

Miss Palmer, Have you got a headache.'* 

Carlotta, No. 

Miss Palmer, Well, in that case can you give 
me a couple of minutes? Because there are one 
or two little things that ought to be looked into. 
I hate to trouble you, but 

Carlotta. Certainly, what is it? It's been 
such a rush since I came back. 

Miss Palmer. I don't believe in putting off. 

Carlotta, Neither do I. But I haven't been 
here a week yet. 



ACT IV 105 

Miss Palmer, Eight days. 

Carlotta. All right. Eight days. 

Miss Palmer. Finance. 

Carlotta, Well, finance. 

Miss Palmer \_taJiing slip from notebook'\. 
Here's the total of what I've spent at the flat dur- 
ing the fourteen months you've been away. In- 
cluding wages, but of course not including my 
salary or the rent. 

Carlotta [refusing the offered slip^. How much 
is it.? 

Miss Palmer, One forty-nine — eleven — six. 

Carlotta, Miraculous, Emmeline! I hope you 
don't want me to praise your economy — ^because 
words simply will not do it. 

Miss Palmer. I only want you to understand 
clearly that if the bank balance is very low it's 
not my fault in any way. 

Carlotta, So the bank balance is very 
low. 

Miss Palmer, I told you this morning what 
it was. You see, while you've been away [glanc- 
ing at hooh'\ you've apparently spent 

Carlotta [with humorous mock solemnity, hid- 
ing her state of nerves'], Emmeline, do you want 
to hear a piercing shriek? Because if you don't, 
don't exasperate me with any more figures. 

Miss Palmer [quite calmly]. Very well. But 
what are you going to do? There's practically 
nothing coming in from books. Mr. Snyder 



106 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

thought Ispenlove's last account was very dis- 
appointing, and the next will be worse. 

Carlotta [who has risen and 'put Diaz's portrait 
in a drawer and sat down again~\ . Have you heard 
how Mrs. Ispenlove is lately? 

Miss Palmer [surprised^. Mel Mrs. Ispen- 
love ! No, why should I hear? 

Carlotta. Mrs. Ispenlove hasn't called by any 
chance, since I came back? 

Miss Palmer. No. [With a certain emphasis.l 
Nobody's called. As I was saying, there's noth- 
ing coming in from your books, and you won't 
make a contract for a new novel. 

Carlotta. What about my private income? 
It used to keep up a household larger than this 
in the Five Towns. 

Miss Palmer. Oh, I've no doubt. But the 
Five Towns isn't London. Seven hundred a year 
or a trifle under won't go far in these mansions. 
Carlotta. Well, I must sell a security. 
Miss Palmer. Thank you. I merely wished 
for instructions. [Beginning again.'\ Now, I've 
found out already that the new cook is very 
extravagant. 

Carlotta. She's worse than that. She's 
narrow-minded. Saute potatoes six times in three 
days seems to me almost bigoted. 

Miss Palmer. And as the housemaid hinted 
to me to-night that the parlourmaid intends to 
give notice to-morrow, I think you might as well 



ACT IV 107 

get rid of the lot at the end of the fortnight. 
There's nothing like a clean sweep. 

Carlotta. Oh, I rather liked the parlourmaid. 
What's her grievance? 

Miss Palmer, It seems she says she under- 
stood you were a single lady. 

Carlotta. The housemaid told you that.? 

Miss Palmer, Yes. 

Carlotta, And what did you say to the house- 
maid? 

Miss Palmer, I didn't say anything. I 
should never think of discussing you with any- 
body — much less servants. 

Carlotta. And that's all? 

Miss Palmer, Yes. It seems she keeps on 
saying every morning while she's brushing Mr. 
Diaz's clothes that she understood you w^re a 
single lady. 

Carlotta, Ah! But I'm not 1 I'm not! 

Miss Palmer [quite calmlyl. Then that was 
my mistake. I told her you were. I'd no idea 
you'd got married while you were away. 

Carlotta. I haven't got married, and I'm not 
single. I never considered your feelings when I 
brought Mr. Diaz to this flat. 

Miss Palmer. Miss Peel, we know what ser- 
vants are, of course, but I hope you don't imagine 
I'm like them. 

Carlotta, But what do you think of it all? 



108 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Miss Palmer. I think it's no business of mine. 
I've always been quite bappy with you. 

Carlotta. Have you ever been in love? 

Miss Palmer. No. 

Carlotta. Will you ever be.? 

Miss Palmer, I don't expect to be. But of 
course one can't answer for the future. 

Carlotta. Emmeline, I could shake you! I 
could tear you to pieces ! [Miss Palmer hooks the 
notebook to her belt.'] I wonder whether it's bet- 
ter to be a woman like you or to be a woman like 
me. 

Miss Palmer. I really don't know. There's 
a good deal to be said on both sides. 

Carlotta. Don't you comprehend I'm in 
agony to-night .^^ 

Miss Palmer. I know you're very upset, and 
I wish I could do something, but I don't exactly 
see what. 

Carlotta. I was obliged to bring Mr. Diaz 
here! He's been very, very ill. I've nursed him. 
Not a physical illness — worse. 

Miss Palmer. Yes. 

Carlotta. He's cured. At least I think he's 
cured, but everything depends on to-night ! 
Everything! If he has a success, a big success, 
all is well. If he doesn't — ! And I'm sitting 
here! He wouldn't let me go with him. He 
daren't! He daren't! Of course he seemed 
very cool and cheerful to you, but it was all 



ACT IV 109 

pretence. I know what he felt like. [She 
shudders.'] At the last moment he daren't let me 
go with him. And so here I am — and in a few 
minutes he'll be playing. 

Miss Palmer. Then you'll soon know. 

Carlotta [standing up], Emmeline, you must 
go to the concert — this instant. 

Miss Palmer. But I'm not dressed. 

Carlotta. Put on my cloak and keep it on. 
Here's the ticket. Take a taxi. No, you mustn't 
have my cloak. [Snatching it away from her.] 
He might think it was me. You've got one of 
your own. The very moment the applause is 
finished drive back and tell me. You'll get here 
first, and then if it's not a success I shall know 
what to say to him when he comes. I must know 
how it went before he has to tell me! I must! 
And I can rely on you, can't I, not to come home 
with a fairy-tale. 

Miss Palmer [quite calmly]. Most decidedly. 
[Escit Miss Palmer, r. The door remains open 
and conversation is heard. Re-enter Miss 
Palmer.] 

Mrs. Palmer. Here's a lady wants to see Mr. 
Diaz. 

Carlotta, Now please don't waste time stand- 
ing there. 

Miss Palmer. But 

Carlotta [scarcely able to control herself]. Oh ! 
TeU her to come in here. I'll settle it. 



110 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Miss Palmer \_to parlourmaid, off, as she her- 
self disappears^. Show the lady in, please. 
[Exit Miss Palmer, r. Enter Rosalie, r.] 

Rosalie [startled']. It is you! 

Carlotta [equally startled, after a moment]. 
Yes. . . . But didn't you expect to find me here? 

Rosalie [stiffly]. No, mademoiselle. But I 
might have known it. 

Carlotta [stiffly]. What do you mean, ma- 
dame — you might have known it ? 

Rosalie, What I mean? In truth it is a 
little difficult— [Stops,] 

Carlotta, Will you sit down? This is my 
home. [They sit.] 

Rosalie, Ah ! In effect ! 

Carlotta, So you have come to London, ma- 
dame ? 

Rosalie, Since three months, mademoiselle. 
My knowledge of English, all that I had heard of 
London, made me to think that perhaps London 
would have for me some advantages over Paris. 
And veritably, it was so. 

Carlotta, And so you found out this address? 
[With excessive smiling urbanity.] How did you 
discover it? 

Rosalie, Mademoiselle, it is perhaps best to 
be frank. 

Carlotta, Always. 

Rosalie. Among my new friends there is a 
young musician — violoniste. He is mad about 



ACT IV 111 

music — and about me. He makes part of the 
orchestre of Queen's Hall. He spoke of Diaz, 
with enthusiasm. He was all excited. From 
what appears, Diaz is going to play with orchestre 
at Queen's Hall. I do not understand those 
things, but without doubt you know. It is a 
long time since I heard the name of Diaz. "Well," 
I say to my rioloniste. "You have the address of 
Diaz?" "Why?" he says. "Does that regard 
you?" I say; and I say again, "Have you the 
address of Diaz?" He says "No." "You cannot 
have it for me?" I say. He says "No." "Then you 
do not love me," I say; "and it is finished between 
you and me." Then he has me the address within 
the twenty-four hours. How? I ask not. The 
address is here. I come to see my old friend. 

Carlotta. He is not here. 

Rosalie. Where is he, mademoiselle? 

Carlotta. He is playing at a concert. 

Rosalie. Then it is to-night? ... At what 
hour will he return ? 

Carlotta. I do not know, madame 

Rosalie. But he will return? 

Carlotta. How can I tell madame? 

Rosalie. But he inhabits here? 

Carlotta. Madame, this flat is mine. I have 
lived here alone for a number of years. 

Rosalie. Nevertheless, at present you enter- 
tain Diaz here? 

Carlotta, [^dropping her urbanityl. I must 



112 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

really protest. What has all this got to do with 
you? I don't know you. 

Rosalie [Hsm^, angry, and losing her self- 
control]. How! You do not know me? What 
this has to do with me? But it has everything 
to do with me. I know Monsieur Diaz in Paris. 
He is poor. He has a vice. He is not celebrated. 
Or if he is celebrated I do not know it. While 
loving him, I am also his mother. I find for him 
a home. I pay the rent. I give him often food. 
Yes, and I give him also money. I give him of 
the money which I have received from others. 
Why do I thus act? It is because I am mad about 
him, as the violoniste about me. If Diaz had been 
rich there would have been no others. I should 
have given myself entirely to him. It was my 
dream. But he was poor. It is necessary to live. 
And so — there were others. Then — you arrive. 
I suspect nothing. I was sure of Diaz, quite sure. 
Besides, I liked you. You were sympathique to 
me. You recall to yourself our interview. . . . 
One called me away. The exigencies of the pro- 
fession — what would you? I return. Gone! I 
ask the concierge. No word ! That night — noth- 
ing! Next day — nothing! I wait. Nothing! 
Nothing! Vanished! Disappeared! I resign 
myself — what would you? But I had the heart 
torn. Then after a year, more than a year, I am 
in London and one tells me the name of Diaz. 
After all, he is celebrated. I go to find him. It 



ACT IV 113 

is you that I find. Naturally it is you that I find ! 
I ought to have known it, but truly I am too 
simple. I put questions to you about Diaz, and 
you reply — what has it to do with lae? 

Carlotta. Madame, I assure you 

Rosalie. You steal what is mine, and then you 
permit yourself to protest against my curiosity. 
You are a woman of society. There are some 
who would call me cocotte. Eh, hien! I like better 
to be that than femme du monde. All we others 
say the same thing, and we are right. 

Carlotta. Will you listen to me, please. 

Rosalie, You are with him? Say. 

Carlotta, I have never left him from that day 
to this. 

Rosalie, He could not have forgotten me. 
He was not capable of an infamy. Therefore he 
wrote to me, and you, who never left him, sup- 
pressed his letters. And since he received no 
answer from me, he said to himself, "She is only 
a cocotte. She forgets quickly" — I who was 
mad about him. Is it not true you suppressed 
his letter .f^ 

Carlotta, I did what you would have done in 
my place. 

Rosalie, Ah! [Rather at a loss.'\ You be- 
lieve that? You 

Carlotta, Will you please listen? 

Rosalie [sittingl^. It seems to me that I do 
nothing else. 



114 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta. You said to me in Paris that he 
could not be cured. 

Rosalie. Of the morphine? And I say it again. 
He could not. Never ! 

Carlotta, So you still think so. Well, he is 
cured. 

Rosalie, You make illusions for yourself. 

Carlotta, Nevertheless, he is cured — abso- 
lutely. 

Rosalie, And how.f* 

Carlotta. He cured himself. 

Rosalie. Tell that to another. 

Carlotta. If you prefer it, I cured him. 
From that day when I saw you, to this, he has 
never had morphine. 

Rosalie. How do you know? 

Carlotta [^quietly confident. 1 You may believe 
me. 

Rosalie. But how do you know? You said 
you never left him. What did you mean ? 

Carlotta. For the first three months he was 
never out of my sight, night or day. You under- 
stand — never. 

Rosalie. But it must have been formidable — 
[pronouncing in the French way the second time^ 
formidable ! 

Carlotta. Possibly. 

Rosalie. Tell me! Tell me the details of it! 
That interests me enormously, passionately. 



ACT IV 115 

Carlotta [shaking her head']. No. I shall 
never tell anybody. 

Rosalie. But I can imagine it to myself. The 
frightful scenes ! The terror ! The vileness ! The 
humiliations ! Ah ! The humiliations ! . . . You 
locked the door. He would dispute to you the key. 
He would fight. He would beat you, screaming. 
\_A pause. Carlotta looks at her steadily.] But 
did you not give him a little dose, a very little dose 
at the commencement ? And then less and less ? 

Carlotta. No, I did not. 

Rosalie. Did you not deceive him with injec- 
tions of water? It is the customary method. 

Carlotta. No, I did not. 

Rosalie. Eh hien, there is no need to tell me. 
I know something of all that, myself. It must 
have been revolting, horrible! 

Carlotta. It succeeded. 

Rosalie \_gently~\. Who knows .f* 

Carlotta [^matter-of-fact]. I know. He plays 
now better than ever he played. No, he could 
not do that. But he plays as well as ever he 
played — and he was the greatest pianist in the 
world. The rehearsals have been splendid. To- 
night he takes up his career again. To-morrow 
morning all the newspapers in London, Paris, 
New York, Chicago, Berlin, Boston — they will be 
talking about him. At this very moment he is 
playing. 



116 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Rosalie. And you are here? You are not at 
the concert? 

Carlotta. No, I didn't go to the concert. 

Rosalie, You didn't go! Oh, England — what 
an island ! What an island ! 

Carlotta. Now I've explained to you, ma- 
dame, I hope 

Rosalie. Pardon me, mademoiselle, there 
remains a mystery. When I had the pleasure to 
meet you in Paris, you told me then that you 
had not seen Diaz since many years. It could 
not have been the truth. 

Carlotta. Yes, it was quite true. Seven years. 
Eight years. 

Rosalie. Then there had been letters. 

Carlotta. No. Nothing. 

Rosalie. What! Nothing happens in eight 
years, and then suddenly you come, you take him 
away, in a quarter of an hour, and you never 
leave him? Not possible! 

Carlotta. Madame, it is quite simple. When 
I was a young girl I gave myself to him, and the 
next day I left him — ^because I lacked faith. It 
was a mistake. It was a crime. All his mis- 
fortunes came after that. When I met him 
again, I was determined not to make the same 
error. I owed him my confidence, and I gave it. 
I took care not to lack faith a second time. You 
did not believe that he could be cured; but I 
believed. 



ACT IV 117 

Rosalie. I begin to suspect that after all you 
English women comprehend love — what it is. 

Carlotta [with an appeal~\. Let me beg you — 
I feel sure you are good-natured 

Rosalie [curtlz/]. No! No compliments, 
please. ... I will go. I go now. I leave him to 
you. [Rising. ~\ 

Carlotta [rising eagerly~\. Yes, I knew you 
were good-natured. 

Rosalie [harshly']. But I do it not for you. 
Ah, no ! I do it for him. 

Carlotta, We're alike in that. What I have 
done was for him. 

Rosalie. But you have not given him up. You 
keep him. 

Carlotta. Yes, that's true. It just happens so. 

Rosalie. It also happens that my society would 
not be very good for him. I will hide nothing 
from you, mademoiselle — I too have taken to 
morphine in my turn. What would you.'' 

Carlotta. Oh, I am so sorry. 

Rosalie. Why? I like it. I adore it. It is 
my luxury. Never would I permit myself to be 
cured! Ah! Cured of that? No! . . . Made- 
moiselle, will you tell him that I have not for- 
gotten him? [Carlotta looks at her.] No, do not 
tell him. Possibly I flatter myself, but it might 
disturb him. Adieu, mademoiselle. [She turns 
away.] 



118 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

Carlotta. Madame, before you go, how is your 
little boy ? He must be getting quite big. 

Rosalie [facing her~\. He is dead — since four 
months. 

Carlotta. Dead.'' 

Rosalie. Do not regard me like that. I wear no 
mourning because we others must not wear mourn- 
ing. It is necessary to live and to be gay. 
Carlotta. Madame ! 

Rosalie [savagely~\. Do you think that if my 
little boy had not died I would have given you 
Diaz? Never. I gave him to you only because 
my spirit is broken. [Weakly.'] Life is unjust 
What have I done? Everybody will tell you that 
I am a good girl. Good-bye! [She hurries out 
R, crying.] 

Exit Carlotta, r., following Rosalie, 
Enter Snape, i., with slow, rather agitated dif- 
fidence. He looks about.: 
Re-enter Carlotta, r., weakly. At sight of Snape 
she becomes alert and braces herself. 
Carlotta [highly nervous and apprehensive]. 
What is the matter? What are you doing here, 
Mr. Snape? 

Snape. I hardly know. 

Carlotta. Why are you always so mysterious? 
Snape [simply and gently]. But I'm not mys- 
terious. Miss Peel. I wandered in. 

Carlotta. You didn't come in by the front 
door. I've just been there. 



ACT IV 119 

Snape. Yes, I came in by the front door about 
three minutes ago, but I went round into the 
boudoir because I heard voices in this room. 

Carlotta. But why in God's name aren't you 
at the concert? 

Snape. That's just what I thought I'd better 
tell you. . . . He sent me away. 

Carlotta, What do you mean — ^he sent you 
awa}^? Did he tell you to come back here.^* 

Snape. He didn't tell me to go anywhere. 
When we got to the hall we found the programme 
was late. ... I don't know why. . . . The con- 
ductor had just come into the artistes' room to 
fetch What's-her-name, the soprano. He was in 
a hurry, and he told Mr. Diaz the concerto 
wouldn't be on for half an hour. Mr. Diaz was 
very angry. He said he would not wait. He 
said the order of the programme must be changed. 
. . . Well, it was ! The soprano had to give 
way, and the Casse-Noisette had to give way, and 
the conductor went on to the platform to make 
an explanation. . . . Our friend — followed him. 
. . . Nerves ... of course. 

Carlotta. But I never heard of such a thing. 

Snape. Oh, I've heard of such a thing, but I 
never actually saw it before. 

Carlotta. And couldn't you use your in- 
fluence ? 

Snape. I did what I could. ... But I was 
only cursed for having insisted on getting there 



120 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

too early. I reasoned. I protested. ... At last 
he said: "Leave the hall, Snape. Leave it alto- 
gether." He was furious. He shook. 

Carlotta [sarcastically~\. And you obeyed. 

Snape. I am not the man I was. I had appall- 
ing scenes with our friend before he dismissed 
me some years ago. And since then^! [A ges- 
ture. 1 What could I do? I wandered here. 

Carlotta, But if he was in such a state he 
can't possibly do himself justice! He can't 
possibly ! 

Snape. He cannot. 

Carlotta, I ought to have gone with him and 
stayed in the artistes' room. 

Snape. Assuredly. 

Carlotta. But then he didn't want me to go 
with him, and if I'd insisted it would have made 
him worse. 

Snape. Assuredly. 

Carlotta [with sudden decision, putting on her 
cloak^. I must go to him. I must go to him. If 
he has left the hall before I get there I shall come 
back here immediately. You stay where you are. 

Snape. I prefer that. 
[As Carlotta goes towards the door, enter Miss 
Palmer, n.] 

Carlotta. Well? 

Miss Palmer. It's all over. 

Carlotta, How did he play? 

Miss Palmer, I didn't hear him. 



ACT IV 121 

Carlotta. Didn't hear him? 

Miss Palmer. It had begun before I got there, 
and the doorkeeper wouldn't let anybody into 
the auditorium till it was finished. You know 
how they are. So I stood outside and looked 
through the glass. I could hear the orchestra, 
of course — it was very noisy indeed — but scarcely 
anything of the piano. [Quietly taking her gloves 
off.^ As soon as it was finished they let me in. 

Carlotta, But the applause .f^ 

Miss Palmer. Enthusiastic. Very enthusiastic. 

Carlotta, Terrific? 

Miss Palmer [calmly'\. Yes, I suppose it was. 
Mr. Diaz kept walking off and coming on again, 
and shaking his head. 

Carlotta. But didn't he smile? 

Miss Palmer. I really couldn't tell you. 

Carlotta. But surely you must have seen. 

Miss Palmer. There was so much excitement. 
A lot of people — women — standing round the 
platform, cheering, and so on. 

Carlotta. Did they get on to the platform? 

Miss Palmer, No — it was too high. Then 
Lady Steinberg pushed past me. She said to 
some one that she was going to the artistes' room. 

Snape. That settles it. \_He tries to perform 
a pirouette.l 

Carlotta. Was there an encore? 

Miss Palmer. I don't know. When I came 
away Mr. Diaz was still walking off and coming 



123 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

on again and shaking his head. You told me to 
come back as quickly as I could, didn't you? 
\_She moves away, l.] 

Carlotta. Where are you going? 
Miss Palmer. I'm just going to put the cover 
on the parrot's cage before I forget. Every- 
thing's so upset to-night. \_Ea:ity l.] 
Carlotta [^with a nervous laugli~\. She's an 
angel, but one of these days she'll be the death of 
me. 

Snape, Me too. 

Carlotta, Then it was a tremendous success? 
Snape [nodding gloriously several tijnesi. 
Otherwise Lady Steinberg would never have left 
her seat. In — incredible man ! 

Carlotta. Go and look after him. Go and look 
after him. 

Exit Snape with celerity, u. Carlotta, with an 
inarticulate sound and a gesture of utter ex- 
haustion, falls into an easy chair, and hides 
her face. 
Enter Diaz, r. He comes in very quietly and 
calmly, with an eye on Carlotta. After a 
moment, as he approaches, she hears him and 
shows her face, without, however, changing 
her almost recumbent posture of exhaustion. 
Diaz [somewhat self-conscious^. Well, it's 
over — and it's all right. [He drops his hat and 
muffler on a chair. ^ 



ACT IV 123 

Carlotta [somewhat self-conscious'], I knew it 
would be all right. 

He hends down to hiss her, and as he does so she 
raises her face to his, and throws her arms 
round his neck. 

Diaz [more naturally and freely]. They in- 
sisted on an encore. 

Carlotta [lightly]. What did you give? 

Diaz. I didn't give anything. I insisted they 
shouldn't have an encore. Why should they have 
an encore? 

Carlotta, But surely, darling 

Diaz. The fact is [with faint humour] strictly 
between ourselves, I couldn't quite trust myself 
for an encore. I was afraid I might come to the 
end of my nerve before I came to the end of the 
encore. After all, I've been through something 
to-night. 

Carlotta [dreamily.] Yes. [ She takes his 
hand.] 

Diaz. Everything was against me. A most 
ridiculous scene when I got into the artistes' 
room! They wanted me to hang about for over 
half an hour. I wouldn't. Snape lost his head; 
I had to send him away. I was angry. How- 
ever, he was waiting on the landing, very apolo- 
getic, when I got out of the lift here just now, so 
I benevolently forgave him and he's gone home 
quite happ3^ . . . Yes, I'm glad now that I stuck 
to the Beethoven idea. Anyhow I've knocked on 



124 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

the head the silly notion that I can only play 
Chopin. I fancy I've thrown some new light on the 
Emperor Concerto for them. And I must say they 
admitted it — handsomely, very handsomely. 

Carlotta. Then it was a triumph. 

Diaz. It was as great a triumph as I've ever 
had. 

Carlotta. Really.? 

Diaz. Really. I'm not in the slightest degree 
subject to any illusions about the effect of my 
own playing. I never have been, and I wasn't 
to-night. I always said the thing could be 
done. . . . Well, it's been done. 

Carlotta. I do wish I'd been there. 

Diaz. So do I, in one way. And yet I'm glad 
you weren't. It was safer. I looked at your 
empty seat, and although you weren't in it, I 
could see you all the same. 

[Carlotta jumps up and hisses him.'] 

Diaz. You haven't taken your cloak off. 

Carlotta. As far as that goes, you haven't 
taken your overcoat off. 

Diaz [self-conscious again. The hey of the 
scene changes']. No. I've got to go out again for 
a while. 

Carlotta. Go out? Now.? 

Diaz. Lady Steinberg's making a night of it. 
Reception or something. She came round and 
asked me to look in. In fact she wanted to carry 
me off with her there and then. However, I was 



ACT IV 125 

determined to see you first, so I said I'd appear 
later on. I thought I'd better go. You under- 
stand what the Steinberg woman is in our 
business. , No one can lift a finger in London 
without her. You see, more or less, everybody 
will be there, and if I show myself everybody'll 
know there's been no deception about to-night's 
affair. It will fix me definitely for the future. I 
expect I shan't be more than an hour or so. You 
don't mind, do you? 

Caiiotta levenli/1. Of course not. 

Diaz [absentia/ picking up his hat'\, 1 could 
take you with me, but it might seem — \_With a 
gesture.^ You never know! . . . I'm looking at 
it from your point of view. 

Carlotta, Oh, I shouldn't dream of going. \_She 
taJces off her do ah. He helps her.'\ 

Diaz. Shall you be up when I come back.'* 

Carlotta [sweetly']. I don't know. I may be. 
But I give no guarantee. 

Diaz [casually]. Well — what about finding a 
plot for 3^our new book? 

Carlotta. My new book! What new book? 

Diaz. Aren't you ever going to write another? 
I shouldn't like you to drop novels altogether, 
my dearest. It wouldn't be good for you. 

Carlotta. No, it wouldn't, would it? I must 
rummage into my mind. I haven't looked into the 
dark corners of my mind for ever so long. 

Diaz [smiling]. Do . . . Well 



126 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

\^He kisses her hand, and then picks up his hat. 
She gives a little wave to him. Exit Diaz, u.. 
When he has gone Carlotta -falls forward 
with her head and arms on the piano. She 
is heard sobbing. Re-enter Diaz, r., quickly 
and rather noisily.^ 

Diaz. My muffler! \^He stands still, then 
rushes to Carlotta.'] Carline! [He pulls her to- 
wards him and looks her in the face,] What is 
it? 

Carlotta [limply, but mastering her tears, and 
making an effort to smiW}. My poor boy! It's 
very wicked of you \_a sob] to forget your muffler. 
[She smiles for an instant comically.] 

Diaz. Carline, you're upset because I'm leav- 
ing you alone. I'm most frightfully sorry, I am 
really, but I assure you 

Carlotta [as before, putting her hand over his 
mouth, and gazing into his face]. No, no! I 
won't hear it. You're a g-g-great artist — again. 
And — g-g-great artists must not apologize. Don't 
you remember I said to you — that night — that 
artists like you were autocrats. 

Diaz. I remember, but I must confess my— 

Carlotta [as before, stopping his mouth again]. 
It is I who had better confess. I'm incorrigible. 
Nine years ago — the day after that night — I 
didn't trust you. I'd no faith. And now I find 
I've learnt nothing and I'm at it again, 

Diaz [low]. At what.'* 



ACT IV 127 

Carlotta \^still between humour and emotion']. 
Not trusting you. You ought really to send me 
to a hospital for incurables. ... I put the 
photograph away — and I thought I was putting 
the original away. I w^anted to put myself away 
too \_sob] — only the drawer was too small. And 
then when you told me not to go to the concert 
I thought, "He's afraid of me becoming one of 
his — bad habits, and he's trying to break himself." 
\_With her hand she again stops Diaz from speak' 
ing.'\ And when you began to talk about my next 
novel I thought, "His idea is to find me a little 
gentle ladj^like occupation so that the days won't 
be too long for me and I shan't worry him." And, 
and [50&] fourthly and lastly — when 3^ou rushed 
off to Lady Steinberg's it seemed as if there'd 
been a competition between youi* career — and 
your Carlotta, and the career had got the first 
prize. I'd been backing it to beat the field for 
a year past, and yet when it won I felt quite — 
queer. Really, sometimes I'm just as irrational 
as a man. Have you noticed it? . . . Well, get 
your muffler and run off. I'll wait. Darling, all 
my faith's mysteriously come back. \_J)iaz takes 
off his overcoat. 1 What are you doing.? 

Diaz. I'm not going. 

Carlotta. But you must. Be serious, my 
poor boy. This isn't a play night. It's a work 
night. 

Diaz, I'm not going. And if all the future 



1S8 SACRED AND PROFANE LOVE 

depended on it, I'm not going. [^Pause. He 
turns suddenly/ away from her.^ Carline, you 
must take something. You must drink to our mar- 
riage. 

Carlotta, Our marriage? 

Diaz. Till to-night — I could not suggest it, 
could I.'' 

Carlotta, I quite see that we can't continue 
to shock London indefinitely. 

Diaz [at the table where the tray is~\. There's 
only one glass. 

Carlotta. Isn't it enough? 

Diaz [springing to her and seizing both her 
hands^. You! . . . Do you imagine that I ever 
forget one thing? 

Carlotta. What? 

Diaz. You see this man and this artist stand- 
ing in front of you. . . . You created him. He's 
all yours. 

Carlotta [dropping her head on his shoulder, 
with significance^. He doesn't know his strength. 
[Lightly. ] He's hurting my wrists dreadfully. 

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